Chapter 2: Before the Sun Sets
The eve of the Sabbath is a famously busy time in the Jewish woman’s week.
Lavish meals must be prepared.
Children must be bathed.
The home must be cleaned.
And it all needs to be finished before the sun sets.
Challah
The Jewish woman is commanded to separate the potential from the result to braid her past and current selves together, to separate hair from open air.
Look through the hot glass
but don’t touch
life is rising before your eyes.
Cholent
The woman
left the cholent pot
in the shtetl oven
before Shabbos,
fetched it for the morning meal,
walked down the road
with steam floating up
from between her hands.
WINE
What connects this world and the next?
The words we say
with wine
in our hands, the wine slipping
down our throats, the wine
rubbed in our baby boys' mouths
at eight days old.
You can tell a man’s character by checking three things: how he handles money, how he handles anger, & how he handles wine.
BATH
The bath holds the water
the water holds the child
I'm holding a pen
I'm trying to write myself
next to an ocean,
my child plays in the sand,
saltwater dries on my skin.
Ima, I want to come out.
BLECH
The place in the kitchen the kids shouldn’t touch.
The house in Brooklyn that caught on fire,
The hundreds of houses that have caught on fire.
The bread that warms before we break it.
The blech covers the flame like panic covers a deeper layer of panic.
The small flame burns all night and all day,
keeping the cholent hot.
TIMERS
Set the time you want the light to go on.
Set the time you want the heat to go on.
Set the time you want the singing
to stop, the time you want the guests
to leave, the kids to sleep, the time
that is neither a line nor a circle,
but a spiral propelling us forward.
FLOOR
Milk. Beads. Crayons. Cereal. Dust. Apple core. Oil. Hair. Headband. Pants. Scarf. Backpack. Note to teacher. Note to self. Note to G-d. Pencil. Fork. Spoon. Toy. Toy. Toy. Open book.
