MY FATHER IN HEAVEN ON YOM KIPPUR

My Father has lived in Heaven
for what seems like an eternity

On earth
he was a good man
He gave food to the hungry

In Heaven
he is a good man still
But he has no food to give

In Heaven there is no time
There only is
It is always now

And now, in Heaven
Yom Kippur is

My Father is a good man 

Because it is Yom Kippur
he enters the synagogue of Heaven

He is fasting. It seems
he has been fasting forever
Nor does he take even one drop of water
to ease his thirst

My Father feels the gnawing of hunger
in his belly—the rasping in his throat
the pounding in his head

There is thunder, 
There is fire
The heavens are howling

In Heaven there is no time
Yom Kippur in Heaven
is now

The Heavenly congregation is 
huge — innumerable— the men, 

in the men’s section
draped in their heavenly blue and white 
prayer shawls

their heads, covered against the pain
of their hunger

their deep pain-filled voices chanting in unison
they rock and bow and moan

We have sinned
We have sinned
We have sinned

With clenched fists
they are pounding their hearts

They are praying to the tune
of the hunger of the world
They pray for the end of hunger

They pray for the life of the one
who is starving
Of the masses —- innumerable--
who are starving

whose bellies are bloated
whose skins thin as paper
whose eyes, still living, are growing dim

My Father is feeling the pain
of their starving
The Heavens resound with the pain
of their hunger

​Until they are fed
the sun will not set
on Yom Kippur
in Heaven

This poem first appeared in the Bards Against Hunger 10 Year Anniversary Anthology in 2023.

Click to hear the poet read the poem.