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we forget just how full of light the night is

we forget just how full of light the night is


the sun was our king, and the moon was our queen


and fire to carry their light to earth was dangerous and miraculous and only as plentiful as gathered wood and candlewax


but now, we've brought down

so many little suns and moons

in street lamps, in square screens, on skyscraper summits


that we've blotted out heavenly radiance for our own,

so now

we forget just how full of light the night is


.


the sky doesn't leak light thorugh the stars like accidental pockmarks, no


when we leave our saturated cities, when we breathe shabbes air with the trees, if we went back, to when Rabbi Hillel, Rabbi Gamliel and Rav Abba each had one star to count to mark the beginning and end of each day


the sky they were looking up at in total devotion was more star than abyss, more glitter than canvas, more inundated with heavenly radiance than new york city sidewalks with gum or rush hour bay bridge with tire treads


we've forgotten just how full of light, the night is


.


but the planets are still dancing in their eternal memory


hashem's handiwork is drowned out but not erased


the rhythm that has kept them all moving in synchronized two-step - the intricacy and size of which goes beyond all comprehension - is still being softly orchestrated and recreated each night


we've half-mimicked the most incomprehensible thing


god's first creation


taken "vayihi or" and brought it to the earthen floor


but it could never compare to the ceiling of shamayim

which even when you can't see it shines infinite and pure


what does it mean to replace god's miracles with our own?


.


I wish we could just turn of all the lights for a night to bask in her glow again


I wish we could exist in the abundance of the world as it's been gifted rather than numbing and overfilling it with excess from our own hand


I wish we knew how to love miracles rather than replace them

.

I want to remember that even in the deepest unknowns I've ever walked through, I'm already gifted with more radiance than I could ever need


I want to turn off every street lamp and screen light in my life and bask in the tapestry that I've become numb to


I want to remember, and never forget,

just how full of light the night is

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