An American Jew Thinks About Gaza

Disclaimer: This poem has nothing to do with the title... or does it?

Ill and weary,
worn and always seemingly distressed,
dressed down before a mirror of self.

I’m a blank page on a computer screen.
I’m self-righteously cocksure
and everything in-between.

I hunger like an aphid on a leaf,
but achievement comes from the belief
in the existence of relief.

Out there somewhere, looking and waiting
to be found and allowed to make its home
in our collective guts, kneading and needing.

Everyday is a newsprint elegy
reflecting the ache inside—
a gnawing, maternal guilt.

Death and dismay are cavalier
as they strut their stuff
but there’s nada-zip-zilch to fear?

Just another bitter taste,
a stinging sensation in our skin.
The auto-erotic flagellation of time.

Confliction is the affliction
as what was promised comes at a price,
as those who want the right to return

are just pawns in a larger game
as God takes a blind eye to what
either side does

in the different names for the same being.