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Unmourned (poem)


Martin Herskovitz                                     

Israel                                              

 

It is a time of morning in Israel

Grandparents mourn their grandchildren

And children their parents.

An entire country versed in mourning

Except for me.

Amid the mourners’ wails

my grandparents hold their faces earthbound

To catch some of the tears deemed for others.

Tears they have never known for

All died with them

Except for a few.

And those were afraid

That if they ever started crying

They would never stop

So they never started.

It is left to me to cry but

I have no rivulets of tears

On a face contorted in pain.

I can weep but meager tears

Not warm full tears to rinse their sorrow.

They long to be mourned

But I, who have never known their embrace, cannot.

But I know their pain

And their sorrow

Is interred in me

It is our link

And it will have to suffice

It is a time of mourning

And I sit among the unmourned