By
Howard Debs
Before Hanukkah, 2018
Hanuka candle dances warm
To help you weather your heavy storm
Shines like my lighthouse light this night
to bring your worried soul my light
—from “Hanuka’s Flame” by Woody Guthrie, 1949
On the one hand…
On October 27th, at the Tree Of Life
synagogue while sabbath
morning services ensue
a crazed gunman, a Jew-hater
kills eleven injuring seven in Pittsburgh.
On October 31st, the owner of
a kosher-style eatery
in Austin finds out the windows of
his food truck have been smashed to
smithereens, an Iron Cross ominously
left amidst the debris.
On November 4th at Harvard Square
in Cambridge a 66-year-old Jewish woman
is accosted her attacker putting his
fist on her throat, pushing her,
shouting hateful words.
On November 14th during a performance
of “Fiddler on the Roof” at the
Hippodrome Theatre in Baltimore
a man calls out “Heil Hitler” panicking
many who flee in fear.
On November 29th, the office
of a Jewish professor at Columbia University
in New York who writes about the Holocaust
is vandalized, virulent graffiti
and swastikas spray painted on the walls—
On the other hand…
On November 27th, at around 9:30 p.m.
a fire of yet unknown origin breaks out
in the sanctuary at Congregation
Torah Vachesed in Houston, as dozens
of evening service worshippers rush to
escape, firefighters and police run into
the building and rescue every single
sacred Torah scroll, bringing them
all out, safe and sound.
On December 2nd, as darkness falls in
Kankakee, one of its few remaining
Jewish residents will place his menorah
in the window for all to see and
light one small candle, for eight nights in all,
to keep the flame of memory and truth ignited.
Author’s note: Tevye’s monologue in “Fiddler on the Roof” invokes the Jewish life philosophy “on the other hand.” There is always “the other hand.” In an old tale which tells of coming doom when the world will succumb to a second flood, the rabbi goes to his people and says: “Jews, we have to learn to live under water.”
Deborah E. Lipstadt, professor of Holocaust history at Emory University whose win at trial against a Holocaust denier in England was portrayed in the 2016 movie “Denial” sums it up this way in a recent (October 18) New York Times article “I’m not a Chicken Little who’s always yelling, ‘It’s worse than it’s ever been!’ But now I think it’s worse than it’s ever been.” She’s talking about America. It’s time to pick a side. Elie Wiesel makes it clear: “We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” Ergo, the poetry of bearing witness.
Howard Debs
Howard Richard Debs is a recipient of the 2015 Anna Davidson Rosenberg Poetry Awards. His essays, fiction, and poetry appear internationally in numerous publications; His book Gallery: A Collection of Pictures and Words, is a 2017 Best Book Awards and 2018 Book Excellence Awards recipient. He is co-editor of New Voices: Contemporary Writers Confronting the Holocaust forthcoming in 2019 from Vallentine Mitchell of London, publisher of the first English language edition of Anne Frank’s diary. He is listed in the Poets & Writers Directory: https://www.pw.org/content/howard_debs
Thank you for your kind words and for taking the time to write them.
You have written powerfully. I am deeply saddened by the people and events that moved you to do so. No small part of America's light comes from Hanukkah candles.