On a Hilltop at the Nassar Farm (audio only)
Click the icon above to listen to this audio poem.
Poems
Find and share the perfect poems.
More by this poet
Visiting Auschwitz (audio only)
Click the icon above to listen to this audio poem.
2011
Letter to Jerusalem
To hold the bird and not to crush her, that is the secret. Sand turned too quickly to cement and who cares if the builders lose their arms? The musk of smoldered rats on sticks that trailed their tails through tunnels underground. Trickster of light, I walk your cobbled alleys all night long and drink your salt. City of bones, I return to you with dust on my tongue. Return to your ruined temple, your spirit of revolt. Return to you, the ache at the center of the world.
2011
Flags
We have put up many flags,
they have put up many flags.
To make us think that they are happy.
To make them think that we are happy.
—Yehuda Amichai
Everywhere, in the fertile soil of this land,
we've planted flags. Flags sprout like the hair
from an old man's nostrils.2011