israeli politics

What we all seem to be lacking is a measure of control. The more a person knows about the world right now, the more confused and helpless that person feels. If you don’t know about anything more than what is going on in your little village, maybe you can cope.

Today I suddenly remembered the first year my family had television in Israel – 1972. There was only one channel and it was black and white. One afternoon I tuned on to an Arabic lesson. I wrote a poem then:

MABROUK

Confined to the couch by a bad back,

I watch Israel Educational TV with my son.

There is an Arabic program on

and we slowly learn that the man

at the final fitting for a suit

(“Mabrouk, Jamil!”), and the woman

showing her new dress to her best friend

(“Mabrouk, Azziza!”), are getting married.

We watch the men come in to shave the groom,

the women warm the bride with dance and song,

the separate dinners with ululations

and more congratulations. Then

the two groups bring the couple to the square.

And when Azziza and Jamil look at each other‑ ‑

slowly, shyly‑ ‑I begin to cry.

I always cry at chasenes.

My own life was simpler, and I believed that the problems of the world could be solved through understanding – and maybe through television. I think it’s in my book, Ignorant Armies. It’s out of print, but maybe I’ll include it in my Selected if there’s a demand. Tell me if you like it.

January 29, 2022 – control Read Post »

israeli politics

We go to Tel Aviv to bring food to the infected kids and take out their dog. I only noticed that Ezi wasn’t wearing his mask when I downloaded the picture. Now I’m worried.

But the picture is a perfect documentation of the rambunctious dog and Ezi’s sense of peace – just across the street from where he grew up.

january 28, 2022 – ezi in the city Read Post »

israeli politics

Days after we watched “Don’t Look Up” we keep finding it coming back into our conversation. Such an obvious, superficial film, and yet so much a part of our lives. Watching the news – a few minutes of Biden, a few minutes of Bennet, a few minutes of Putin, a second or two of Bezos – and everything blends together with the film. The writing is all over the wall, so dense I can barely see the wall itself.

I’m tempted to ignore the news, and cultivate my own garden, but I don’t think it can really grow if I ignore the society and the world in which I live.

january 28, 2022 – looking up Read Post »

israeli politics

Stutthof

My grandmother was a blinder.*

Even with her glasses

she had to hold the newspaper close to her face

before the candle in the middle of the table.

I wonder if she understood

that the injection seeping into her

at the infirmary in the Camp

was poison or if she thought

she’d be cured and sent back

with her daughters to work

and someday go back to her kitchen

to read the newspaper.

*near-sighted actually

january 27, 2022 – international Read Post »

israeli politics

So the title isn’t really accurate. But last night, as I tossed and turned in my bed, kept awake not only by the lightning and heavy rain but also by the fear that I wouldn’t wake up in time to get to the hospital in time for my echocardiogram at 7, I kept thinking about my granddaughter – who is dying to see the snow falling up north and in Jerusalem. Her father has corona and Ezi has shingles and by the time I get through with the test and the dentist after, the snow will be gone. By 6:30 I was ready to leave and the phone rang. The secretary wanted to tell me that the doctor tested positive and my appointment was canceled. Unfortunately, I turn my phone off until 7.

And so the day continued. I was bundled up as I have never been before in Israel – and the sun came out. At home, Ezi reset the new computer and it worked fine, so he canceled the technician who was on his way over to change the motherboard. Then the computer broke down again. A new television was delivered and finally installed, but doesn’t work with our internet system. The new broken vacuum cleaner, we are told, will not be fixed under warranty.

But all these incidents I put down to Kappara, that is the small troubles that take the place of the big ones. After all, today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day, and when I turn my mind to that from the pain of my granddaughter to thoughts of whether my grandmother knew that she was being injected with poison in the health clinic of Stutthopf, I pray that our lives will be filled with these little contretemps, and we will be able to get through them with a smile.

And that is why my favorite line in literature remains Nabokov’s praise of the mathematician Lobochevsky who discovered that “If parallel

lines do not meet it is not because meet they cannot but because they
have other things to do.”

january 27, 2022 – sturm und drang Read Post »

israeli politics

As the weather becomes snowy in this country, I recall

my mother’s chicken soup: here it is: real chicken soup.

And here is the poem:

The Market

I used to go with my mother to pick chickens for slaughter

I don’t know how she chose them or brought them to the shoichet.

But there they’d be when we got to the shed by the cages,

Hanging from pegs on the ceiling and waiting to bleed dry.

I’d always focus on the plucker’s quick fingers,

The feathers flying like weightless snow

And his fiery torch burning the bumpy taupe skin

That with no effort suddenly resembled my own.

Then at home they’d be dissembled,

The organs, unborn eggs, all pieces examined.

Little spleen, fingers of fat, dear yellow feet,

Laid out on the kashering board,

aslant against the wall of the sink.

Friday evening we’d meet again,

In each of the courses:

Broiled liver ground together with rendered fat,

Blurred as separate beings and members,

Helping me to forget yesterday’s origins.

Next the soup, the essence of sacrifice refined

With orbs of yolk in a promise to come.

But it was the wings that make it all special for me,

Put in my plate with the survivor’s reminder

to fly from the market to the depth of my poems.

january 26, 2022 – snow and chicken soup Read Post »

israeli politics

it took me forever to write this title, so i’m not going to quibble about the fact that the year disappeared.

We bought a new computer – because my old one is incredibly slow and unwieldy. And even though the camera shows all the mess in the corner of my study, I was happy with its speed. But then, the new computer started shutting down in the middle of a zoom – and I’d move back to connect on the old computer, that I stubbornly refused to part with. And now, Ezi, who can barely stand up with the pain from his shingles in his back, has spent the day on the phone with Mohammed, who is instructing him about resetting, rewiring, renewing the old computer. It won’t work by the time I have a zoom in a few hours, and I’ll probably have to include Mohammed and Ezi in the event. Moreover, Michael, who was supposed to be handling the technical issue of the zoom, has just handed over the reins to me. So I’ll be hosting and pulling the strings at the same time. On the creaky old computer.

Oh, yes, our TV went two days ago. The few pleasures of staying at home all the time are being denied us. With a little wink, I remind you of the first verse of Samuel Johnson’s Elegy on his friend Dr. Robert Levet.

Condemned to Hope’s delusive mine,

As on we toil from day to day,

By sudden blasts, or slow decline,

Our social comforts drop away.

january 25, 2022 – Zooms and Motherboards Read Post »

israeli politics

NOW? Now they’re talking about it? Over 20 years ago my neighbor and I went crazy over the fact that our building didn’t seem sufficiently supported, and we had the base strengthened. Neither of us was satisfied, and now the standards have changed, but the engineer we spoke with last month predicted that in our neighborhood it wouldn’t matter.

We’ve had earthquakes all along in Tel Aviv. I remember writing in these pages about standing in my sister-in-law’s kitchen and watching the refrigerator move.

In other words, the hysteria now is at least 20 years too late. And I think it takes a long time and a lot of money to prepare building codes and to make sure everyone is safe.

january 24, 2022 – earthquakes – continued Read Post »