LITERARY
Featured Artist: Maureen Wartski
WOMAN AT THE WALL
Head bent and, face averted, her fingers trace the stone
As if the cracks and ridges are beloved skin.
Shoulders hunched, neck turtled into the fold
Of her dark jacket, she speaks toneless words in Hebrew.
Only one word I understand: efo—where?
Who does she call to, standing flat-pressed to the stone?
Perhaps a husband—no, a son or daughter.
Not many years ago she called her children home
When they were long at play, heedless of darkness.
Their hands were too tender for the toys of war.
Efo?
She asks.
Where are you, where have you gone to, where will it end?
Explanation of painting and poem: WOMAN AT THE WALL
While in Israel in 2007, we visited the Western Wall in Jerusalem. Those who wish to approach the wall are divided by gender, so I proceeded respectfully to the women’s section.
The great, ancient wall towered above me, covered with the patina of age. Small notes—prayers, hopes, blessings—were pushed into every niche and crack in the stone.
Near me, a woman stood with hand and forehead pressed against the wall. In a low, tear-choked voice, she whispered words of supplication or yearning. As I listened, I could imagine—see— women all over the world praying for and mourning their lost loved ones. The image was powerful that I later painted the ‘Woman at the Wall’—and wrote of my experience in a poem of that name.
Feautred Artist: MariJo Moore
DOES IT HURT WHEN THE SPIDER SPINS HER WEB?
...cutting into her soul
she pulls strands of moments
better left forgotten
blood-stained and ragged-edged
these strands she weaves into lines of
poetry - songs - stories
some loose strands she ties on her feet and dances...
stomps them until they are flat straight and narrow
much unlike her path
some hard strands she whittles into arrows
with which she pierces her eyes
so tears turned salt can turn again to tears and fall
the almost pretty stands she wraps around her arms
forming bracelets of memories
she dares others to remove
the fine strands of shame she braids into her hair
hoping they will disappear into the wind
as she shakes her head against repeating the past
cutting into her soul is not a pleasant venture
but she is a messenger…a creative creature and so she must
she knows if it doesn't hurt to create
then she is not alive and creation does not exist
for her
the purest form of creativity is existence...
MariJo Moore ©2005
From Confessions of a Madwoman
The Wrong Impression
By Jeffrey M. Kellen
If you ask me, i’ll tell you that I have lots of friends,
Oh yes I do!
They love to laugh and joke with me,
Oh yes they do,
I flap my arms, I wriggle my fingers,
Oh yes I do,
And they laugh right along,
Oh yes they do!
I hear loud noises and I scream and shout,
Oh yes I do,
And my friends they laugh and joke with me,
Oh yes they do!
The lights at school, they flicker and are bright, and cause me to bang my head,
Oh yes I do!
And my friends they laugh and joke with me,
Oh yes they do!
My grandma, she put a wooly sweater on my one time (silly grandma, she didn’t know), and it made me
Itch terribly so,
I hollered and fussed and cried,
Oh yes I did,
But my friends, they just laughed and joked with me,
Oh yes they did,
I tried looking at letters and numbers once, all jumbled up they were,
And I did things that weren’t so nice,
Oh yes I did!
But my friends, they just laughed and joked with me,
Oh yes they did!
So you see, I have lots of friends, lots of them, everywhere I go,
School, park, or mall,
They all like to laugh and joke with me,
And my friends, you know, they wouldn’t laugh and joke with me,
If they weren’t my real friends…
Would they?
Jeffrey M. Kellen