Eillene Leistner – Three Poems

Crossings – A fugue poem

He escaped Siberia across the Urals, his nearly frozen nose

still intact, his once blond hair turned jet coal black.

He crossed the Urals back to his home, destroyed by war,

neighbors still killing his kin and more.

He crossed that broken world,

left it to be rebuilt, without his skills, talents, brains or wit.

He crossed two countries, found a DP camp with thousands of others

waiting to flee. Laws changed, two years passed, he traded

vouchers for fresh food and silver to buy his passage at sea.

He crossed the ocean on a repurposed war ship, learned

new languages, escaped his past with a strong English name.

Welcomed by new family, he buried old memories, never to talk

about the pain or joy, though sometimes he cried like a little boy.

Carpentry was his trade, he built pearl tables that were inlaid

and cabinets galore, eventually he had his own furniture store.

He fell in love with a local girl, married and fathered three daughters

who knew his strange habit of crossing a street to greet

a newcomer, stranger, a world unto themselves, who had

crossed land, sea and time to meet on new terrain.

They were his landsman* from the old country and unafraid,

he asked each one, “Vos Macht’s a Yid?”**

How are you? Have you found your reason to live?

They laughed, sometimes hugged, they who had left

full lives behind, each branded

with erased history, never to see their lost loves and homes.

He drew them near,

refugees no more,

trembling on the sands of their new life’s shore.

*a fellow Jew from the same country or region in Eastern Europe

**How are you?

 

~

 

Morning Prayer 

        After “Museum” by Shuntaro Tanikawa

 

Prayer books open beside Torah scrolls

flow with ancient sounds to reveal the holy.

White-fringed shawls wrap their heads

in ancient tents of purity during morning

prayers, Hebrew utterances, beseeching lips

flutter like hummingbirds near nectar,

torsos sway like young birches in the wind.

Psalms and prayers speak of longings,

pain, awe and transcendence, sanctify simple

words, elevate love to a higher realm.

Under each prayer shawl silent meditation

drenches prayers with intention.

A sudden ray of sun splits the morning,

outside shadows emerge on sacred surfaces.

With pain in our hearts we shift from

one ritual to another and cry out for healing.

We seek prayer books near Torah scrolls

that flow with ancient sounds to reveal the holy.

 

~

 

Creation

       After “Design” by Billy Collins

I rinse a bowl of red lentils

and shape them into a steep

mound with my hands.

This is the mountain

of the Paradise firestorm

that rained down

blazing flames on California

slopes and roads,

I say to no one.

This is Kilauea, a shield

volcano erupting

rivers of lava flow

down its sides, pouring

black igneous rock on beaches

that swell near the waters

I sailed many years ago.

This is Masada, red

with the blood of dead zealots,

overrun by Roman soldiers,

who climbed as the sun broke the sky.

This is the summit at Sinai,
where Moses received

the tablets of God

and I am meant to feel

as if

I was there.

This is every hill,

every peak,

every mound I have climbed

to witness creation,

I say to no one.

This is the mound of red

lentils, I choose to create

into my fiery soup.

 

_________

 

At various times in her life, poetry has been Eillene Leistner’s primary creative expression. With college and graduate degrees in English Literature, she taught writing at Hunter College and, for several years, published newspaper articles in a regional Jewish weekly before her children were born. She has been writing and studying poetry for many years and was recognized by Writer’s Digest in 2022 for her poem “Beacon Hill Beach.” She currently leads monthly poetry workshops and readings at her synagogue in New Jersey.