April 14-18, 2020
April 14, 2020
i know there are people there who are bored and lonely in their quarantine, especially since we keep getting last minute laws - like the one today tfor a shutdown this afternoon until after the holiday. Especially since our prime minister doesn't follow the rules.
we are not bored. 1. we exercised this morning with our trainer at whatsapp - now i remember what pain is. 2. we planted all the flowers and veggies Oren brought us together with a big sack of dirt. this took hours. 3. we did our constitutional and checked out the neighbors. 4, we cooked the artichokes that got delivered to us directly from the farm. 5. we got back Ezi's PET CT results and are trying to figure it out. tonight we will watch the news and stew over the fact that there is no government at the same time that we praise the health system
A Word in Edgewise is here on Kindle.. The hard copy will wait until the printer returns. You can pre-order by writing me.
April 15, 2020
today is my mother's birthday, and i think she'd enjoy a few dialogues from the plague journal.
"My next supermarket order - next week on the 19. I made it so long ago i can't remember what I ordered !" I say, and my friend responds: "MINE is coming on the 15th"
She tells me she made meatballs and schnitzel and stuffed peppers and roast ... "But you live alone! And you're going to eat it all with...?" "Bread."
"I miss my hairdresser! I miss my physiotherapist! I want to get my teeth clean!" "Me too!" "Me too!" "Me Too!"
The same situation in so many homes around the world. those who have food and medical attention.
We have been seeing the same number of cases every day for at least a week. the curve is not flattening but not curving. and this is because we didn't take the different communities into consideration. People in villages, in sectors like the religious quarters, were not really shown how to take this seriously and now they are getting sick in geographical bursts. It's probably easier to get treated in this way, but it should never have happened. We should have made sure that everyone understands social distancing, and fewer people would have been infected, and we would be able to get the economy moving again.
April 16, 2020
Yes, my mother got through wars and innumerable difficulties and would have laughed at our silly complaints. But we can't seem to follow the rules anyway. it's as if they are torture for us. I went with Ezi to get his stitches removed and the little shopping center was full of people - unmasked - drinking the coffee they bought from the take-away cafe and eating cakes. Me, i'm in a mask and gloves and embarrassed by it -
but i do break rules too - i'm not sure we were 2 meters apart for this visit:
April 17, 2020
Social Distance
What I want to know
Is what
is beyond
what I can see
from my window.
What lives
in the world
beyond
our home, our shield
from the dangerous air
outside
In the balcony across the street
there is an appliance
partly covered in a sheet.
Could it function
If the owner
could get to it?
For hours
I watch the street
to see people
passing by
wearing masks.
They have tasks
I am not allowed
To complete.
In the movies on television -
My frame to the past -
people touch one another,
lean together, speak intimately
,
kiss, as if
it was natural
the only way to live
What I want to know
Is what
is beyond
what I can see
from my window.
April 18, 2020
I kept waiting to announce it because i was waiting to publish the hardcover book with the blurbs and the smashing cover by Assaf Guery, but i kind of gave up hope. so here is the link and here are the blurbs:
"God created women but Karen Alkalay-Gut created the poems that define them. She understands why the creation of women was the necessary step in the creation of human life. I love her humor as much as her seriousness."
--Erica Jong, author of Fear of Flying
A Word in Edgewise is a super-edgy but also truly wise compilation of the unheard voices of Biblical women. Listen to Eve reminding us of "the hunger / that comes from eating," Lot's daughters not getting mad, just getting even, with a father who was prepared to give them away to rapists, Delilah "who gets a real rush/ from being on top" and is proud "to go down in history/ as irresistible," a Jezebel who craves "whatever is forbidden," a Hagar perplexed by "these monotheists." Karen Alkalay-Gut is a the top of her form in this book: truth-telling, compassionate, courageous. Read her and smile, and think yes, that's how it was, that's how it is.
--Alicia Ostriker, author of Waiting for the Light