chaos and honey

In This Oppressive Sun

I am an old woman
on a chair in this oppressive sun
selling things of petite merit to survive.
I eat but do not worry about taste.
I am invisible, having moved here and
been abandoned by family that has
disappeared into the abyss.
I hear screams, witness parking lot
snarls, listen to arguments and
continue to sit.
I do not investigate
since no one would choose me as
judge. I am too frail to move much and
I have little motivation except enough
money to buy food for tomorrow.
I shall not be rewarded for being a
living corpse near
this office building's door front.
I am less than human and
I will never be part of the modern machine.

They walk by me, bow their heads, do
not attempt to speak with me
from fear I will drool or utter
absurdities in a language they don'’t
comprehend. My undergarments are gray,
my dress is bedraggled,
My hair is gone. I wear a poor hat, I cannot
afford a decent wig. I am a scrap of
paper that the street sweeper waits to
throw away. My face has
become a lemon with heavy folds
covered with wrinkles.

Cars abound, I haven'’t
ridden in one for years, I see
mobile phones but no one will call me.
My funeral shall be devoid of
sorrow except for a few people who dwell in
our dilapidated apartment building and
who will whisper - she is better off...
A club without enough members,
the last one to perish
will have no one left to turn out the light.
The trees turn, the days
continue and life will go on without
me not pausing for a second.
My knick-knacks lay on a dirty cloth sheet.
People gaze at the objects
embarrassed for me, and try to
find the cheapest thing to buy.
I am only a little better than a beggar with a
cup in my hand, or a man holding a microphone and
singing folk songs from the old country.


And the people continue to walk by
entering the cement building for their
appointments trying to control the future.
The guards for the building dare not
ask me to move since I am older than the wind
in their eyes. I have only entered
the building a few times since I began
selling my things a few years ago,
and that has been to escape torrential rains.
I have been allowed to drip and
dry off on an old wooden chair
which I assume they keep around for
discarded boxes and the unclean
waiting for delivery trucks or the
ambulance to pick up the burdensome.
I am afraid I shall die here on the
pavement and nobody will bother to move me
until the birds have made an intolerable mess.
I hear news via a radio in the mornings and
evenings before and after I have sold
my wares on the sidewalk. I know
other places exist, and I imagine these
far away places are paved with gold and
the people sleep on silk sheets as
I eat my soup and drink my weak tea.
Every day I wake and I am grateful
but no longer understand why.
Until I remember the children who I occasionally
see and make me smile. Their
innocence, their joy, their satisfaction with
the world is clear and I know
that once too I felt I was part of
something grand and that I was
not merely a ball of dust,
which has not fallen completely apart yet.

by Zevchi - Kfar Saba - June 2006