In Talia’s birth month the air cools
and leaves morph slowly
into shades of her hair
A sleeping instinct wakes
with the first cold
and the sight of fire-tipped trees.
I reach for comfort,
to touch her shape
and my fingers brush empty space
My sister’s month holds the Jewish Days of Awe
when time moves
differently:
pools
and clings
to hushed voices and tired bodies in the sanctuary,
then bubbles suddenly
in unholy laughter.
We used to giggle during Kol Nidre,
play catch or hide
and seek
while adults talked over Rosh Hashanah lunch
or broke their fast on Yom Kippur,
the sounds of our play mixing, colliding,
slipping over grown-up conversation.
This Rosh Hashanah, away from
home and the familiar rush and eddy
of holiday time
I find you everywhere
and nowhere:
formless
and fathomless
as the light,
drenching everything
in honey
Meanders 