High Holy Period by Sarah Farbiarz

Before we fasted I soaked

my first ever period underwear, stains like the scars

that fade for just that moment (when I press on them);

cleanliness isn’t permanent and I

thank God for this, for stains that return,

for my body’s gunk,

a few degrees warmer than I am.

Warmth is not happiness,

is “exuviated, bereft”

is exercising and hurting

leaving with full longing,

מין המרחקים, hummed. !

I   will   be   empty until   break-the-fast and still my body

will let go of more. I chat with the person

in my uterus

As they (cry their tears down my legs,)

drum on my walls, It is too intimate, I have never seen my insides.

They’re

machinery, each month

turning, but their frenzied pulsing would be Jackson Pollok

if I wrote it down more often. I speak with a God I don’t believe in

each Yom Kippur, like clockwork I push so hard and he comes only after

someone else starts to cry, it is enough to know

that my nature is stagnant but

nurture writhes within me: Even period

cramping would be

minimized

if I could eat. When I believed in God I wanted to climb

Calder sculptures,

but I’ve got uncertainty of my own, now,

so this Yom Kippur, I will strain for a replacement desperation.

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