Adonai of Night and of Flowers
Introducing the poetry of Susan Comninos
Editor’s note: it is a great joy to introduce you to Susan Comninos, who will be serving JUDITH as the guest editor of poetry through July, and perhaps beyond.
Imagining Abraham as my silent immigrant parent My father was a wandering Aramean; he placed a dead deer in my hands. My father was a wandering Aramean and erased for me the path to his home. My father was a wandering Aramean whose goodness was the oar that rowed him in the boat of his soul. Alone my father was an Aramean. He spotted the dark in blurred halos, my father. Was an Aramean wandering because he'd been cast out by beasts? My father wandered. Like an Aramean -- his feet were his indigent's shoes. He unveiled himself to the air like a shivering bride. My father, my wanderer, walked on the ice near our home like a heron. My father was the ice of the lake, a bird of sparse plumage. He wandered, as feathers fly.
Bequeathal
If legacy means long arms—
my grandfather’s smile
stitched to the gap
in my teeth, then
when I die, make
me a golem
from a palmful
of dirt and torn
pocket of time, with arms
long enough to reach
you, to play
with the fringes at your waist.
A LOVE POEM for my mother Adonai of night and of flowers, God of my life. I was not expected to be beautiful. When flowers grew from my hands I surprised everyone but my mother. In any language my name means lily. Basin in a vase or bath of rain, I have the same wholly American whorls (fingerprints, curls) and features as when my first-generation mother invited me into being her future. She asked and I answered with a face like her mama’s mishpokhe, but with different colored petals: my hair, oh my eyes.
Ashamnu [We Have Trespassed]
song of the slim girls, starved
We have trespassed; we have dealt treacherously
with our desire, coercing a rebirth from bone;
we have acted perversely; we have done wrong
in our bodies, wishing them hollow as folly;
we have robbed; we have spoken slander
against the grown, women full of the mind;
we have been presumptuous; we have done violence
to ourselves, to our own candied forms;
we have practiced deceit; we have counseled evil
before mirrors, exhorting by example;
we have revolted; we have blasphemed
our wombs to slivers, no blood tricked from ivory;
we have spoken falsehood; we have scoffed
at the edible, animal that it is;
we have rebelled; we have committed iniquity
only in a doze, that nodding boy, who alone knows our skin;
we have been stiff-necked, we have acted wickedly
as sexless pixies, before their hair grows in;
we have transgressed; we have oppressed
appetite, our sentient caterwaul;
we have dealt corruptly; we have committed abomination
as old as the science that declared the earth round;
we have gone astray; we have led others astray --
off the world's abdomen, as we found it, flat.
Avinu Malkeinu [Our Father, Our King] I don't feel like a cherished girl. The fall enters as a forgiven guest, known to the dinner party, if absent for seasons. Our father, our king, the air is full of tolerant embraces. Trees thrust out their branches, and I cannot do my part. Our father, why have you brought me into your orchard of plums? To show me the autumnal variety? I am well-versed in the sight of fruit as it stacks in pails. What good does it do you, to show me faultless things? You are fast losing my most faithful sense of your indifference. Our king, for years, I have known you as you claimed to be: wrathful, or dispassionate, but always at a good distance. Now you torment me with nearness. Take your hand from my head; I'll uncover my eyes, I'll testify to your off-kilter beauty. Without direction, I'd recall for a jury: this harvest is more lovely and worthy of exhibit than the most mature and idiosyncratic among your works. I swear, I curse. I ask for a remission of words, and to be left in an unenlightened silence. Or, as you once did with ribs, reconsider my exquisite oneness, which you created. May you see fit to deliver me an unwashed and distinctly wicked man. May you make him offensive as an apple eater, a clothes wearer, a sky-fisting bellower, but send me a dirty beloved, whose body will drop down, distend and discharge like an overripe berry into my knowledged mouth.
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Susan Comninos is the author of a recent book of poems, “Out of Nowhere” (SFA Press/Texas A&M, 2022). Her individual poems have appeared in the Harvard Review Online, Rattle, The Common, Prairie Schooner and North American Review, among others. Since 2017, she’s taught writing to undergraduates at Siena College, The College of St. Rose, and SUNY Albany, as well as adults in the community. In July, she’s going on a volunteer mission to Israel. And she's thrilled to be joining Judith as a guest poetry editor later this summer.
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Five Tiny Delights:
1. Social dancing. I dance salsa, bachata and Argentine tango whenever I get the chance.
2. Saying hello to every dog that I pass on the street. Literally. Every. Single. Dog.
3. The first cup of coffee in the morning. I’m not choosy about how I get my caffeine fix, so instant is fine.
4. My mom’s smile. I’m a caregiver for a parent with Alzheimer’s. Her happiness and moments of lucidity are soul-sustaining.
5. Having a glass of wine with friends. For a while, I favored meaty reds, like Malbec. Now I like citrusy whites.
Five tiny JEWISH delights:
1. Singing “Dayenu” at the Seder table with my cousins. Post-childhood, we got hazy about the verses, but we’ve relearned the lyrics in recent years.
2. Learning to read Hebrew as an adult. It thrills me whenever I stream an Israeli TV series (think: “The Chef” or “Aviram Katz”), and I can recognize the names of the cast in the opening credits. Hello, Guri Alfi!
3. Access to Sefaria.org, an online library of traditional Jewish texts. It comes in handy when I teach nature poems by Jewish authors, including “Advice from a Caterpillar” by Amy Gerstler. Want to know what the Tanakh has to say about blight and infestation? Look here.
4. Finding community with other Jewish writers.
5. That the people of Israel live.
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Congratulations to the journal and to Susan! As she knows, I am a fan of her work, and I think she's a great choice for poetry editor. I'll look forward to seeing future issues.
These poems are so beautiful 😍