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Poetry

Prayers Toward the Temple Mount

by Casualene Meyer

At the Western Wall
Emah scrawls my name on parchments
in a hand only the Divine can read—
forces them between the Herodian stones
as Abbah knocks at the wall
with rhythmic swaying
of orthodox prayer,
wafts currents of words
against the stones,
hopes a door will open
to his faint and fervent
tapping without touching.

And far from Jerusalem
I hear Shoshana pray:
her tongue touches,
taps, and glides
along the magic places of her mouth
that mold sound into meaning,
that send a shaft of words
beyond the limestone margins
of night and day—

eyes closed, I burrow
behind the blackness
of her words, black ink on black,
waiting for another phrase
waiting for any word
but Amen.