Encounter in Palestine
He's maybe 30,walking up the hillsmiling,at the sunlight,at me,who he does not know,at being alive.he claps his handstogether, smiling,opening his mouth,saying,"No soldiers today!It's a good day!"
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The Last Tangible
This week, the last parcel arrived, the last tangible from Palestine. We had mailed it from the post office near the Old City in Quds, using a kit purchased at same. This consisted of a box, some stout...
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Taste of Palestine
This scrap of paper came from a Palestinian home, in Bethlehem. While we were there as Ecumenical Accompaniers, we spent a lot of time with N. and A. as our drivers, and we got to know each other...
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All things must...
It astonishes me that this blog has run for, what, nearly 10 years? It has been a running commentary on my life and what I have seen and felt and gone through and enjoyed, and a few of you have been...
View ArticleAre you still processing...?
Last evening, we were kindly invited out to supper at friends we know through our church connections. Among those present was a couple who had done overseas partnership work (formerly "missionary"...
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Awash in blessing
We arrived in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, on Tuesday, having discovered that our neat regional airline, Porter, flies into Boston, which makes for a fairly easy trip altogether.Our dear friend James met...
View ArticleRetooling
I have been thinking about this blog off and on, and you readers who have been waiting for the final curtain may be surprised to see new posts.As it happens, I am in Massachusetts for a variety of...
View ArticleThe Young Mens' Voices
The Powwow SingersThe young men sing high,voices almost like birds' bodiesaloft on wings like scooped handsflinging them,voices with all the feelingof the world in them,an offering without flameto All...
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A Rabbi, an Artist, Two Ministers and an old Canadian guy sit down for a beer...
Bloggers actually meeting in person is a relatively rare phenom, so when we got the chance to meet Reb Rachel Barenblatt, the Velveteen Rabbi (Now a real Rabbi), who lives near our hosts James and Di,...
View ArticleInvitation
Why do you hesitate, Mahmoud,what keeps you from my tent?The day has boiled your blood,the night now wrenches your skin--what keeps you from my tent?The stones cut your feet,your belly will not take...
View ArticleA Year Ago Today,
we were in Aviemore, Scotland, at a timeshare with my distant cousin and his wife. Back in Canada, my mother died in hospital in palliative care on this day, after having refused, for entirely...
View ArticleMy Father's Picture
I have set it asidea dozen times nowin trying to muck outthe study,disinfecting it as a spare bedroom.Found an old letterfrom him, reminding meof things I'd leftat the houseon my last visit:he'd had to...
View ArticleCampsite Morning
Morning cool to thepoint of cold,coffee raging in the pot,raw in the cup,barely tamed by milk.It burns, burns like the sun,the sun tonguesthe mouth of our skin,wind paws our hair.The airthe sunthe...
View ArticleSpeed
Trees like fountain waters,slowest of exultations,dance and singingbeyond our firefly senses--are we but feckless points of light to them?Their bass laughter at usgoes unheard:we do not live long...
View ArticleHow are you feeling...?
The other day, we got a phone call from a dear friend. She had been thinking of us, she said, with what was going on in Gaza. How were we feeling?The short answer is, anguished. I will personally add,...
View ArticleEyeless in Gaza, 2014
Running Orders by Lena Khalaf TuffahaThey call us now.Before they drop the bombs.The phone ringsand someone who knows my first namecalls and says in perfect Arabic"This is David."And in my stupor of...
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Having served together, now visiting together
There are fewer true gentlemen (I like the French term "bonhomme"--it says it through the curtain of language) than my former colleague Eric. It was my privilege to serve with him as an Ecumenical...
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The Rime of the Ancient...
The grieving travelercannot continue,but does,the desert stretchinginto foreverbefore him,every night a differentcaravanserais,new facesas familiaras his owntrembling handwhere compass pointshave long...
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