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Poetry, Grades 10-12: First Place
Untitled— Hannah Bernstein
This poem, untitled for a reason, left blank,
for the boy in my history class. This is for you —
you say anti-Semitism is fleeting and beautiful; thinking
my body is not a cavern of all who came before me.
Am Yisrael, who died to set me free.
I hear your voice, cracking, new;
it explodes m’ha’shamayim, my free American skies;
but they are littered with false blues. The same sky here
is the same sky everywhere, the same sky
where false blues turn to red as we blink.
And I still like to think that when the sun rises
over the Old City, telling us we have survived again,
everyone stands completely still, because I would.
But too much fog lies between me and that holiness —
sickly gray between my lips and clouds in my eyes, blinding me.
I have kept silent about this war; letting the air
speak for me instead of my mother tongue.
Untitled air takes up space, it fills the empty —
but with more blankness. The monster in the quiet night,
he whispers: forget who you are, and I did.
But I am the woven basket that carried Moses to his destiny,
I am the well that followed Miriam, and the ark and the dove,
I am the forty days of rain, blue water falling like air;
cleansing me. I sent my sins away with Azazel in that bleak desert, and
I blessed Israel’s tents with Bil’aam’s voice in my head.
I rode through history in the mouths of those who kept us alive, I am
the continuation. Torah sheh b’al peh grows in me,
and I have never felt more radiant.
I am clean, I am new, I am free from my own shackles,
the monster is me in the mirror but I turned away from him.
I am speaking. My mouth is open.
When you look away, who will speak for you?
Who will speak for you, if not yourself?
for the boy in my history class. This is for you —
you say anti-Semitism is fleeting and beautiful; thinking
my body is not a cavern of all who came before me.
Am Yisrael, who died to set me free.
I hear your voice, cracking, new;
it explodes m’ha’shamayim, my free American skies;
but they are littered with false blues. The same sky here
is the same sky everywhere, the same sky
where false blues turn to red as we blink.
And I still like to think that when the sun rises
over the Old City, telling us we have survived again,
everyone stands completely still, because I would.
But too much fog lies between me and that holiness —
sickly gray between my lips and clouds in my eyes, blinding me.
I have kept silent about this war; letting the air
speak for me instead of my mother tongue.
Untitled air takes up space, it fills the empty —
but with more blankness. The monster in the quiet night,
he whispers: forget who you are, and I did.
But I am the woven basket that carried Moses to his destiny,
I am the well that followed Miriam, and the ark and the dove,
I am the forty days of rain, blue water falling like air;
cleansing me. I sent my sins away with Azazel in that bleak desert, and
I blessed Israel’s tents with Bil’aam’s voice in my head.
I rode through history in the mouths of those who kept us alive, I am
the continuation. Torah sheh b’al peh grows in me,
and I have never felt more radiant.
I am clean, I am new, I am free from my own shackles,
the monster is me in the mirror but I turned away from him.
I am speaking. My mouth is open.
When you look away, who will speak for you?
Who will speak for you, if not yourself?
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