Sunday 13 July 2014

Once

I went to Israel once
But before I went I was quizzed by those who would fly me there
Torah portions needed explaining because at 26 I could have been anyone
At 26 I wasn’t just free to board and for the first time in my whole life
I had to explain myself, convince someone else that I was safe
Safe enough to be let on the plane to go there, to her

I went to Israel once and I saw the lines
On her face they were deep and curved, whittled from suffering mouths,
they were rivers with no water
But on her streets I saw nothing and I walked a lot of those streets
Too stupid to be afraid and too wild to know I was stupid I just put
one foot in front of the other as I smoked like the Israelis smoke
Like rockets smoke when they hit, but not just between lips
This smoke courts a different kind of cancer

I went to Israel once and I felt free
Not the kind of home of the brave shit, but like the wind shit
The kind where you might be prepared to die if you were asked to fight
But fighting doesn’t work and it hasn’t worked and it’s not working
Blue veins of division clogged with rubbish and with tents
Whose beds are slept in, but whose children want better beds, bunk beds
Not to hide under but to climb

I went to Israel once, but it was just once
So I can’t beat that drum or point my finger because
I only know how it felt and how it looked and what kind of beautiful voodoo
It did on my soul and how cocktails and falafel danced on my tongue
But now my tongue is steeped in bile that tastes like wax
and causes the juices from my jaw to run like tears run and
tear tracks down my face like desperate fingers twisted into claws
attached to hands pushing up soil from graves
So many graves, shallow and numerous
Streets full of them, them that carry bloodied children in their arms
Them that don’t build bomb shelters for their own


I went to Israel once and I would go back
I’d go back because that’s what we do
We keep going back and forth, but always back to where it all remains
To where the ghosts of our millions found the strength to finally give up
I use the word ‘we’, though in this seemingly eternal conflict I will pull no triggers
I will throw no grenades and I will never put on a helmet
But I will ‘we’ until I can no longer because I am a Jew and for that I will not be sorry
I will not defend this fighting and I will not be baited to debate
But I will feel every death, every ounce of blood spilled will be a little bit on my hands
Every rocket fired will be a little closer to my house and I am so fucking lucky
That I live here, that I get to live here
And that I went to Israel once

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