This piece is part of our Wit­ness­ing series, which shares pieces from Israeli authors and authors in Israel, as well as the expe­ri­ences of Jew­ish writ­ers around the globe in the after­math of Octo­ber 7th.

It is crit­i­cal to under­stand his­to­ry not just through the books that will be writ­ten lat­er, but also through the first-hand tes­ti­monies and real-time account­ing of events as they occur. At Jew­ish Book Coun­cil, we under­stand the val­ue of these writ­ten tes­ti­mo­ni­als and of shar­ing these indi­vid­ual expe­ri­ences. It’s more impor­tant now than ever to give space to these voic­es and narratives.

In col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Jew­ish Book Coun­cil, JBI is record­ing writ­ers’ first-hand accounts, as shared with and pub­lished by JBC, to increase the acces­si­bil­i­ty of these accounts for indi­vid­u­als who are blind, have low vision or are print disabled. 

On the evening of the Pesach 

We were piled into Uncle Asher’s 

Scar­let Lexus — the one that 

Held the whiff of his old grapejuice-scented 

Pipe I nev­er liked much as a kid but which 

Remind­ed me of Seder cel­e­bra­tions and the 

Mat­zohs that my father always hid in our 

Apart­ment when we were just kids 

And the Seder meant you couldn’t eat the challah. 


My cousins had a group of kids:

The dar­ling boys (a year apart),

Girls dressed in princess tutus, 

And the old­est (on the eve of his Bar Mitz­vah) Max.

That evening on their doorstep we had gath­ered wish­es on 

The blue mezuzah and my father donned his kippa.


Max was in cologne to woo the girls at school 

And Uncle Ash­er brought the wine, which he almost drank 

Alone (the pre­ferred bev­er­age of the evening grape juice).

We arranged the Seder plate and lost the bone 

(But to the dog) and Aunt Adi­na hid the matzohs 

In the yard for all the kids to find. 

Some­one com­plained that Max was in the game

But he was not yet a Bar Mitz­vah so it was conceded, 

And any­way he’d lost (like­ly of his own design).


He wore a Star of David and a yel­low kippa 

Which had fall­en some­where in the yard while he was running;

Nev­er­the­less the evening car­ried on 

And Uncle Ash­er gave him a replacement, 

Read­ing, in blue letters

Col­ored like the blue mezuzah,

Nev­er Again.”

And I am sure he knew the implications. 


We heard the news­cast ring­ing from the TV

(The house­hold was either not reli­gious or someone

Left it on out of neglect).

Today they were not let­ting Jews on campus 

And I thought it was a joke the Jew­ish news had played 

And we were not yet halfway through the prayers 

And lit­tle Max said, Do they want us dead?”

And Uncle Ash­er said, A bunch of clowns!” 

And Aunt Adi­na said, They’ll be arrested!” 

And my dad said, Yes.” 


But 

We are just cel­e­brat­ing, eat­ing matzoh, 

Sit­ting as a fam­i­ly togeth­er just like oth­er families 

And what have we done wrong?”


In the yard I found the yel­low kippa 

And it remind­ed me of yel­low stars.


The views and opin­ions expressed above are those of the author, based on their obser­va­tions and experiences.

Sup­port the work of Jew­ish Book Coun­cil and become a mem­ber today.

Liza Libes found­ed her lit­er­ary project, Pens and Poi­son, in New York City. Her writ­ing, which fre­quent­ly address­es themes of Judaism and female iden­ti­ty, has appeared in Gone Lawn, Wil­lows Wept Review, Jew­ish Women of Words and else­where. Liza is also an entre­pre­neur and a clas­si­cal music enthu­si­ast. Her lat­est poet­ry col­lec­tion, Illic­it King­dom, is avail­able on Amazon.