will not harvest the corners of our love
~wrote Anatiya
34but let the poor gather up grapes
and baskets of purple-hearted figs.
35I will toss morsels to the loveless throngs
as into a wishing well.
36Why do they sit by
with their heads bowed
and eyes lowered?
37Let them gather and search
for the fountain of youth
in the midst of the city,
and drink from its glistening draft.
38Sated in its dew
they will never die old,
but sing and dance into Sheol
a thousand years young.
39Lo, my kisses I will pile upon my palm like pollen on a petal,
and blow them to you on a sweet gust of my breath
that they might germinate in your pores.
~wrote Anatiya.
40Your head is the chief cornerstone of the Temple
upon which bears down an unbearable wall.
41My heart is shattered when I see you crumble.
God’s wrath is a poisoned well in your gut
rumbling up into your throat. Vile taste!
42Where is our mikvah of pure living waters?
43Hark! The outcry of my poor prophet!
The mountains tremble.
The Temple walls shudder and quake.
44The world tilts awkwardly,
like a drunkard, staggering through the ruins.
45Seized by desolation . . . I cry for you from the dark corner.
I gather your shadow into my arms.
46It is brittle and cold, quaking in the first throes of dying.
47I brush off the dust and kiss its fluttering eyelids,
and gently rock it in the cradle of my bosom, singing:
48“Hush, shadow, hush. I am your island of calm.
Return to our prophet,
surround his body like a moat around a castle,
fed by the fount of his tears.
Let no killing thing cross.
Let none pull asunder.”
49The shadow slips from me, healed,
and Jeremiah finally succumbs
to slumber, 50face damp,
and young as a child.
51In the morning I press my lips
to the tearstains on his sleeping mat,
and I shiver as a flower with pleasure
with the touch of morning dew.
9
O to be in the desert with you,
with its ribbons of gold and rose.
2To leave this people
and to hide in a secret oasis,
and to love unashamed
under the open sky
with its voyeuristic sun,
3our bodies sanded and rose-colored.
4The desert stares like the giant amber eye
of a lion, purring,
we dance and leap, two flecks,
where nobody heeds us
~wrote Anatiya.
5O friend of my heart,
were you only my brother
we could suckle from the same breast.
6We could speak loudly across the marketplace,
“Peace, sister! Peace, brother!”
7You could embrace me and kiss me lightly.
If only you were a nobody like me!
8If only you were insignificant, overlooked,
we could shout our careless love with trumpets
and none would pay us any heed!
~wrote Anatiya.
9I assure you, the place in my dreams does exist.
10A place on the opposite side of the world
that is the opposite of everything here.
11A garden springs up in the midst of an orchard,
and a stone bench—
carved in the manner of Betzalel,
overlaid with gold,
two cherubs leaning in, wings touching
to form a seat for two—
waits by a fountain that spills,
whose bubbles are the giggling of children.
12The opposite of everything here,
the sandy road is a pathway of precious stones
crushed into glittering dust
~wrote Anatiya.
13Paradise is only as far as the flame from the wick.
14A bench in the manner of Betzalel
waits for two lovers to rest and find
