(Beyond 11)

“[This clock] chimes the time twice,” he explains, “just in case you missed it the first time around. Sometimes you’re busy when a clock strikes and you miss the count. This one waits a few seconds and gives you a second chance.” Unstuck in time.

— from an interview of Kurt Vonnegut by William T. Noble (published in the Detroit Sunday News Magazine June 18, 1972 and republished in the 1999 Conversations with Kurt Vonnegut.

In this spirit, I offer a second opportunity to listen to Voices of Grief and Struggle, and important and powerful resource posted on December 9, 2014.

In addition, for those who maybe missed the fact that this is National Poetry Month, here is a second chance of sorts, an opportunity to consider Audre Lorde’s “Coal” — with it’s reminder to consider “who pays what to speak” — as well as some words from Marge Piercy, (re-)reminding us all to “honor Jews who changed”:

…those who chose the desert over bondage,
who walked into the strange and became strangers
and gave birth to children who could look down
on them standing on their shoulders for having
been slaves. We honor those who let go of everything
but freedom, who ran, who revolted, who fought,
who became other by saving themselves.

We counted 11 on the evening of April 14. Tonight, we count….

Making the Omer Count

from On the Road to Knowing: A Journey Away from Oppression
A key element in the journey from liberation to revelation is understanding the workings of oppression, and our part in them. We cannot work effectively to end what we do not comprehend.

So this year, moving from Passover to Shavuot, I commit to learning more about how oppression works and how liberation is accomplished. I invite others to join me:

Let’s work together, as we count the Omer, to make this Omer count.

Thoughts and sources welcome.

Share this graphic to encourage others to participate.

A Meditation

Aware that we are on a journey toward knowing God — from liberation to revelation — I undertake to know more today than I did yesterday about the workings of oppression.

I bless and count [full Hebrew blessings in feminine and masculine address]:

Blessed are You, God, Ruler/Spirit of the Universe, who has sanctified us with Your commandments and commanded us to count the Omer.

Today is twelve days which are one week and five days in the Omer.
Hayom shnaym asar yom shehaym shavuah echad vechamishah yamim la-omer.

In the spirit of the Exodus, I pray for the release of all whose bodies and spirits remain captive, and pledge my own hands to help effect that liberation.