The Rabbi’s Red Ink
By Shereen Akhtar
In our first house-let in London, she drew on the tablecloth to create
a calligraphic feast. Our friends all begged for her ink on their bodies.
Alefs that rose up from one side to form a podium.
Once, I leaned her back, mouth to mouth in the kitchen,
claimed a medal of my own, but I never knew which words were holy.
Shereen, eize seret. So I list our choices, two movies, set in Egypt?
The braids on her challah deflate as they cool, becoming rigid, dusty
with flour in the ridges. She laughs no—it means I have a story to tell.
Khaloosh on the sofa, she said: you know how I wished I could
get a tattoo? Lost in the museum gift shop, she stood for hours
studying colour charts, the red too reluctant to spread
against the orange like ants’ faces to flames. Bat sheer.
Songbird. Muse.
Daughter of poetry.
From Tel Aviv, she drove us miles into the desert. She stayed up,
a crumbling blintz stuffed with mushrooms and rice, to read Shofet
by the light of her phone. Moshe through Shmuel. Esh, she said.
Sof haderech. It’s over. It was good. She’s almost a judge herself
but at night, she flips me over from sleep. When I don’t protest,
she says chetzi co-ach. Half strength, half power. I learned Hebrew
from a website. After she drew my name in ink. I asked her again
to invade my body with it. Excusing myself, I borrow her alphabet.
Still I confuse ayin with tzadi—which is the body with a head?
Outside, we are stalked by red-breasted robins.
When we visit her cousin in Tel Aviv, they share a red-lipped joint.
Lost in the gift shop, she separated pigments, grids in her eyes.
Daughter of poetry. Once I leaned her back, mouth to mouth,
she said: you will never believe what happened. Al tarshah li!
Her favourite bird: a robin
perched on a desert rock.
As she turns, I spy red burn under the ink.
People may try to shoot her. Her guilt
tries to shoot her.
When she walks
riff out in the desert, she slouches take a photo. I kiss the calligraphy
on her skin too holy to touch. The words burn. The words are moot.
Copyright Credit: Shereen Akhtar, "The Rabbi’s Red Ink" from Rabbi / Robin. Copyright © 2024 by Shereen Akhtar. Reprinted by permission of Blue Diode Press.
Source: Rabbi / Robin (Blue Diode Press, 2024)