In honor of Israel’s 60th anniversary, Rabbi Yonah of the Blogshul and Jewlicious Festival fame was inspired (in part by Craig Taubman’s 60 hours of music for Israel) to create a blog (60bloggers.com) where 60 different Jewish bloggers would contribute a post that demonstrated the things about Israel that we love. For my contribution, I chose to share with everyone a love-poem that I wrote to Israel when I was taking the highly-controversial Poetry for the People class at UC Berkeley under the late poetess June Jordan. It was my first direct confrontation with anti-Zionism from the graduate-student instructors and Jordan herself that lead me on the path to become the pro-Israel activist that I was for the better part of my college years. But I digress. With no further adieu, here it is:

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Secret Admirer

Haifa

Sapphire sparkling blue water polishing me

Tel Aviv

My old and new spring of buildings and ocean

Ha Negev

Wistful dry wind sanding my eyes

I love you.

Your cool green water pours me out

My eyes tear when I remember you

Eretz Israel, love me as your own son.

I know you.

You’ve met me before.

In salty-dry craters of rocky hills

Misty forests bursting with green

Sun-swallowed mazes of tents and bazaars…

I know that you have no reason to love me.

I never write

I never call

Not born beneath your Asiatic stars

Not born from dust in a land

Where holy men still kiss the ground

Jerusalem–

Years pass since last we met but

I don’t know how many more years will pass but

I don’t know what language to ask it in but

Love me.

Tomer Altman © 2000-2008

“Lo Que Debemos Que Decir”

Poetry For The People

Spring 2000

Cross-posted to Oy Bay!.

The 60 Bloggers project is co-production of Jewlicious.com and the Let My People Sing Festival. It is published daily for 60 days to celebrate Israel’s 60 birthday.