To love a country as if you’ve lost one: as if

it were you on a plane departing from America 

forever, clouds closing like curtains on your country, 

the last scene in which you’re a madman scribbling

the names of your favorite flowers, trees and birds

you’d never see again, your address and phone number

you’d never use again, the color of your father’s eyes,

your mother’s hair, terrified you could forget these.

To love a country as if I was my mother last spring

hobbling, insisting I help her climb all the way up

to the capitol, as if she were here before you today

instead of me, explaining her tears, cheeks pink

as the cherry blossoms coloring the air that day when

she stopped, turned to me, and said: You know, mi’jo,

it isn’t where you’re born that matters, it’s where

you choose to love - that’s your country.


haggadah Section: -- Exodus Story
Source: Mishkan HaSeder