GARMENTS
Aurora Levin-Morales
Every garment can be a tallis.
Spirit is in the details, the stitching,
the fibers, the weave. I cut and sew,
embroider and mend, I choose the pants
with the wide yoke, the breathable waist,
the shirt dyed like rainy-day clouds,
the one with swirls like ocean currents,
the long white linen shift.
Each one is an intention,
each one a way to enter
the day, the night, the moment.
Each one a song of ancestors, of
tropical rain, spattered leaves and striped wind,
the wide legs and gathered ankles
of brown kin in hot places, the t-shirts
each one a poem, the loose tops and tunics
my storyteller’s robes.
Each one is a treasured story
The African pants in pea green foliage
I bought that autumn in New Orleans,
the micro-patterned purple XL dress shirt
from the general store in Glendive, Montana
snowed in, two days out of Standing Rock,
in a campground full of oil workers.
The fuchsia Irish sweater I gifted myself
for finishing a book.
I come from garment workers
tailors and dressmakers,
sweatshop and factory workers,
makers of lace and uniforms, shirtwaists,
girdles and bras. When I tie my knots,
when I take in, let out, replace elastic gone saggy
their fingers interlace with mine,
Their fingers, pierced by needles,
their knotted knuckles finally at rest
swing from gussets and hems like tzitzit.
Each buttonhole is a blessing.
Each seam is praise.
Blessed too is the spirit
that sanctifies our style,
that decks us with shattered light
and glinting buckles.
Behold, I am wrapped in my choices,
I am garbed with splendor
I drink from rivers of delight.
Permission
“Garments” 2024 Aurora Levins Morales
From Rimonim Ritual Poetry of Jewish Liberation
, (Brooklyn, NY Ayin Press, 2024).
This signifies permission for a one-time use in the inaugural issue of GERSHOM, Multicultural Intergenerational Jewish Journal.
