Earworm

-Peggy Landsman

February 14, 2011

"If just once, on the same Friday night, every Jew lights the Shabbos candles, the Messiah will come."
— An insistent Hasid on the street in New York City, almost forty years ago. 

Glenn Gould stopped playing Beethoven
My CD player died

Every light that was shining
Suddenly blinked off

The world was washed in darkness
Like before the Old Man punched his time clock.

It was cool in my dark, silent space
Cool enough, and peaceful

I sat awhile thinking of Eve
In the garden at nightfall.

All at once, it dawned on me:
This was Friday night.

It had been ages since I was a child
Watching my mother lighting the candles,

Joining her in singing the blessing-
After "Ah-men," we added "Ah-women!" 

Before too long, Glenn Gould was back playing
And there was light again.

I took a shower, took my time,
Washed my long brown hair.

"Baruch atah adonai..."

I could not get that blessing out of my mind.

I stood naked in the shower,
Not at all like Eve

In the first spring rain.

Peggy Landsman's work has been published in many online and print literary journals and anthologies, including Bridges, Poetica, Cyclamens and Swords, and the South African journal, Jewish Affairs. Her poetry chapbook, To-wit To-woo, is available from FootHills Publishing. Her out-of-print romance novel, Passion's Professor, which she wrote under the pen name Samantha Rhodes, is now available on her web site. She lives in South Florida where she swims in the warm Atlantic Ocean every chance she gets. http://peggylandsman.com.