ASK (ELUL 19)


And what if no one's listening,
if I'm truly alone?

Do I really get to start over?
What if I can't forgive myself?

When did I stop believing
in impossible stories?

Can you hear me now,
will you answer my call?

Can you imagine wanting
to see inside my chest,

my good inclination
and my bad one side by side?

Am I exposing too much,
will I scare you away?

Do you really want me
as flawed as I am?

This poem started life as a "twenty questions" poem, in which each line was a question except for the last one. It stayed that way for several days. And then I returned to it and realized that I only wanted ten questions, and I didn't want a conclusive answer at the end.

I'm participating again this year in #blogElul, an internet-wide carnival of themed posts aimed at waking the heart and soul before the Days of Awe. (Organized by Ima Bima.) You can read last year's and this year's #blogElul posts via the Elul tag; last year's posts are also available, lightly revised, in the print chapbook Elul Reflections.