Urban Poppy Field

Tiny Joys

Tiny joys, joys like a lizard's tail:
a sudden sea between two city buildings in the west,
windows glitterng in the setting sun--
everything blessed!

Everything blessed.
A consoling music in everything,
in everything mysteries and hints--
and everything waiting for corals of beautiful words
to be strung by the imagination on its string.


--Ra'hel, translated by Robert Friend with Shimon Sandbank.

Here is my field of poppies, a sudden sea between city buildings. Crowned by razor wire. How often the tenderest, sweetest moments in life have hidden bits of razor in them, how often the deepest joys cut deeply into us.