Yehuda Amichai

ON THE DAY OF ATONEMENT

On the Day of Atonement in 1967

I put on my festive dark suit and went to the Old City in Jerusalem.

I stood for a long time before the alcove shop of an Arab

not far from the Damascus Gate, a store

of buttons and zippers and spools

of multicolor threads and snaps and buckles.

A splendid multi-colored light, like an open Holy Ark.

I told him in my heart that my father too

had just such a shop of threads and buttons.

I explained to him in my heart of all the decades

and the events and the reasons I am now here,

and my father’s shop is burned up there and he is buried here.

When I finished it was the hour of Ne’ila.

He too pulled down the shutter and locked the gate

And I returned home with all the worshippers

 

*Ne’ila is the final prayer of the Day of Atonement, when the gates to heaven are locked as the fates of all have been sealed.