Poet Beth "Batyah" Elishevah Ginzberg expresses her creative poetic meditations about water as a very powerful atmospheric element of the environment. Ginzberg wrote these poems at the East Rogers Park Lake Michigan Beaches, on-the-spot, to experientially convey the full effect of the Great Lakes of Chicago, IL USA for your reading pleasure.

Monday, February 12, 2018

SEEKING GOD, FINDING HIM AND THEN FLOURISHING

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Seek and find? Look and see? Listen and hear? Sniff and smell? Touch and feel? Believe and acquiesce? Buy and have ownership?

What is it we are looking for? To turn wishes into prayers and prayers into blessings. To know the Hebrew language and have it become your mantra as a dance step or too as you simply sit and rest. To follow its regular beat. To make it your routine.

To smile at a friend and in this way observe the commandment of Pirkei Avot to greet everyone with a cheerful countenance. To as you walk on the street greet a stranger with this same smile and he then becomes not a stranger but a friend. To look the stranger on the street with direct eye contact as he begs you for money and be honest with him, yes you have money or no  you do not. To simply give a man a dollar that would be so appreciated. To instead give him a loaf of bread, if that is what you can give.

Where can I see God if I look for Him? In the gratitude reflected in this strangers eyes as he thanks you for the gift. Or to send someone an anonymous gift card in a greetings card to give someone money but not to identify yourself so he need not reciprocate. You get no reward, the gift is entirely his.

Colors? Do you know what color is which? Ever taken an Art Class? Look all around you inside or out, see all the colors of the rainbow without straining. To love the yellows as you turn them into gold and the grays as you turn them into silver. A door knob? Gold, silver, brass or nickel? Change in your hands: quarters, dimes, nickels, pennies. Colorful pieces of cut glass: gems, jewels. Handcrafting necklaces, bracelets, headbands. Creating something out of nothing. Appreciating the nothing that becomes something. Knowing it is God Who made the difference.

A marble countertop with swirls of silvers inside whites. The text of your favorite book, the binding strong and secure, a book as a companion. The Torah being this Book. Integrating the Commandments into your brain so it becomes second nature to follow them to a T. T is also for Teaching, to Teach Torah and feel comfort and achievement in teaching it. 

Finding God? Seek. Find. Flourish.     

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