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Why I Unplug On Shabbat

deer on forest path
It’s not out of Orthodoxy,
It’s the kavanah of Shabbat,
not the halakha
which moves me.
It’s good for my soul
to turn off Facebook,
Blogger, Gmail, Skype
for one day.
It’s good to go out into the salt marsh
where the frogs croak louder
than any person, bird, or car
It’s good to remember what
we came here for,
to this refuge
of wildlife
herons, chipmunks, deer,
muskrat, hawks, and us.
This keeps me going
This sustains me.
 
This poem was first published in Poetica in the Fall of 2011
 

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