One year ago: a hospital room on the seventh floor. I stood for Hallel in grippy socks and thin johnny my hand adorned with a heparin drip on a wheeled pole, leadwires and stickers reporting on my unruly heart. Most days I forget. Mind busied with counting how many meetings are scheduled. Did I make room in the car for my son's double bass, is there milk in the house for tomorrow's cereal? But then your voice knocks and my heart wakes, remembering -- being alive is revelation.     ..read more

  This Shabbat we begin reading the book of Numbers -- in Hebrew, Bamidbar. That's the name given both to the book of Numbers, and to this week's Torah portion, which begins: וַיְדַבֵּ֨ר יְהֹוָ֧''ה אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֛ה בְּמִדְבַּ֥ר סִינַ֖י בְּאֹ֣הֶל מוֹעֵ֑ד And God spoke to Moshe in the wilderness of Sinai, in the tent of meeting... (Numbers 1:1) The wilderness of Sinai. Bamidbar means in the wilderness. Midbar, wilderness, is related to m'daber, when someone speaks. The wilderness is where we hear the voice of God. And the quintessential example of that is Sinai, where we received the revelat ..read more

Before I became a rabbi, I worked as an editor. I edited a monthly paper in south county for a few years after my first stint in graduate school (MFA in writing and literature at Bennington.) A good editor, I came to understand, is one who helps a work become the best version of itself: not imposing her own voice, but helping the writer refine their gem in the ways that will most allow it to shine. Over the last few years I've been bringing that skillset to the publishing work I do at Bayit.  Y'all, it is so much fun. I love helping people uncover what's best in their work. I love uplifti ..read more

"I burst into tears the minute I saw the news." I've already heard that this afternoon from more women than I can count. I want to say first: if reading anything about the E. Jean Carroll case might harm you, maybe because you are a survivor of assault or defamation and this whole news cycle is like salt in a reopened wound, please take care of yourself and click away if you need to. And if that's not you, and if you are one of the people weeping this afternoon because the jury in the Carroll case found the defendant liable for both battery and defamation -- because of the sheer existential re ..read more

This week's Torah portion, Emor, gives us a roadmap for the spiritual flow of the Jewish year. First is Shabbes. "On six days work may be done, but on the seventh day there shall be a sabbath of complete rest." (Lev 23:3) Then comes Passover, the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Then the seven weeks of the Omer, the corridor of time we're in right now. Then Shavuot on the 50th day, festival of first fruits. Then Rosh Hashanah, a day of shofar blasts. Of Yom Kippur, Day of Atonement. Torah says, "וְעִנִּיתֶ֖ם אֶת־נַפְשֹׁתֵיכֶ֑ם " -- usually translated as "you shall practice self-denial," though I pr ..read more

Every sunrise and sunset, birth and death, blossom and snowfall... How does Your mouth not tire of speaking the world into being? Almighty, we can’t imagine infinity without growing weary. It's hard to remember Your mouth is purely metaphor though Your speech is real. You speak every atom in the universe, a mighty chord resounding. If You ever chose silence, even for an instant, we would blink out of existence as though this experiment had never been.   R. Rachel Barenblat     This is a revision of a liturgical poem I wrote several years ago. It appears in my book Open My L ..read more

So many things here used to be yours. I'm looking at two little harlequin dolls. Their hands and feet are made of china; their bodies are silken beanbags dressed in bright flowers. They sit on a bookshelf at my house, as they did at yours. The bookshelf itself was yours, once, too. I think you would like seeing your things interwoven with mine. Of course, either you will never see this -- or you are always already here with me. Usually I assume it's the latter. Every now and then I'm racked with grief-stricken certainty that it's the former. When that passes, I go back to talking to you every ..read more

  The trees are greening. The vibrant chartreuse of brand-new tender leaves is making its way across the valley and up the hills. There is nothing like this color at any other season. I love it so.  How can I write about the glorious leaves of the burning bush outside my window when lawmakers across this country are stripping rights from trans people and banning life-saving medical care? I feel powerless to do anything about Missouri or Montana -- or Texas, where the state Ag department now bans clothing that's "[in]consistent with biological gender." I wish I were kidding about tha ..read more

First thing in the morning the salon is mostly empty. A beautician kneels before the altar with incense, bowing. Fresh fruit honors the ancestors. No hungry ghosts here. The chair next to me is empty. If I cast my gaze up and to the right scanning the shelves of polish I can almost see you out of the corner of my eye sitting beside me. You're wearing capris too, though you called them pedal-pushers. Tea-length sleeves, because you didn't expose your arms once there were wrinkles. Bright lipstick, gold hoops. Your grandson's dating. Every time the orchestra plays he wears his grandfather's tie ..read more

It's the sixth day of Pesah. Our mystics creatively read the holiday's name as peh sah, "The mouth speaks." Seder is a night of story, and that story begins with our ancestors' cry. This whole month of Nisan is dedicated to healing our speech. What better time to offer some small teachings about (potentially) harmful silence and harmful speech?  (On a weird gender note, try searching for an image of an open mouth speaking. Notice how many of the mouths depicted are femme / wearing lipstick / somewhat flirty / etc. The image search algorithm seems to have a certain bias -- implying t ..read more