Since 1999 I have served as Rabbi of Congregation B’nai Olam. B’nai Olam is a unique and special congregation in Fire Island Pines, a beautiful summer community on Fire Island, a barrier island off the Coast of Long Island, which meets only for Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur. In 2007 I began writing a new poem every year for Rosh HaShanah – feel free to also read 2008 or 2009. Here is the fourth, from 2010. Shanah tovah u’metukah.
Rosh HaShana in the Pines 4
Fire Island 2010/5771
The taste of summer is still
sultry yellow, bright and sparkling.
Seasprayed and sunsoaked,
sated with pleasure,
we move with reluctance
as change quietly beckons.
The water has its own cadence
a rhythm under the surface
pulling in and releasing with an outstretched hand.
The quickening of the moon calls us to return
and we gather, seam-dwellers on the edge of the earth.
As the sun lowers itself into the sea
introspection rises.
A sliver cracks the heart of the firmament,
the vast blackness an invitation
to write ourselves anew.
@ 2010 by Hara E. Person
