New Thanksgiving
I dream a dream in which I find myself walking up the steps to a big blue house. A black woman who seems to be working there as a domestic, leans her upper body over
mine and embraces me in a warm, sensual, womb-like fashion, as a mother would embrace her child. Gathered thusly to her bosom I listen with pleasure as she proceeds to
sing in a beautiful, motherly voice, a sort of lullaby that goes:
“Your people and my people, when it won’t matter, just our people.”
We are each the son or daughter of a nation
We are each as well a link in the chain
The chain that binds the world together
The chain that makes all people one
Let no man be so bold or vain
That he would dare to break that chain
In a time when the wolf
Called by the voice in my dreams
Ze’ev Olam
“The World-Wolf”
May be heard howling in the night
All tribes are called to the Mother
Who sings the song
The song of we
All tribes are called to the house
Petals to the flower
Branches to the tree
The “Tree of Trees
Great Great Great”
In a time when Death Itself walks the Earth
When it seems as if the world is under a terrible curse
If not for you and I
Then for our neighbor
All tribes are called to lift up their voices
To join in the anthem of a new day:
“Not your people
Not my people
Just our people”
I dream a dream in which I find myself sitting at a table opposite a well-known Christian. It makes me angry when in the course of our discussion he refers to me as “the
Jew,” though I realize now he didn’t mean this in a negative way, but only wanted to show me how my defensiveness contributes to the atmosphere of tension between us.
In the dream however, I reject the current state of affairs and remark: “It doesn’t make any difference that I’m a Jew and you’re a Christian, it doesn’t matter if you hate me,
because there are much more important things out there we both have to fight against, which are our common enemy.
All tribes are called to the table
Called to a banquet
A banquet of love
Called to share in a New Thanksgiving
Called by the Mother
The child
The dove
The spirit of peace
Forgiveness
Compassion
I dream a dream in which I see two women standing side by side. There is a podium or pulpit nearby laden with sacred books, and I realize that the two women are
preparing to lead a special Sabbath celebration in the temple where I worship.