Untitled, it is. A poem by Jay Yair Brodbar

Untitled, it is

too raw on the eye, 
too raw for the pen. 
The seen cannot 
be unseen. 

A crib—emptied save a small
teddy sodden in curdles of blood.
The young woman yanked out
of an armored jeep, her back 
to the screen, cherry-red 
splotches congealed on her jeans. 
A wall lined with family photos—
young marrieds, elders bearded 
in old country sepias, a smile
at the tractor’s wheel:
all mute, untouched—
all else uprooted, over-
turned. Strewn. More
blood. More bullet holes.

There are attempts at some relief:
the sprawled toddler’s face—
blurred and scrubbed. Grieving
with the newly bereft: we reach back
to the ancients’ vilomah, shakulim—
parents, now sundered, heads prostrate,
hands splayed across tables. We
don’t need to hear the wails. 
We know. We know.

Yes, even the sounds,
somehow, reach us.

It is all 
too much.
Words 
fail.
Craft fails.

So much has failed.

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Jay Yair Brodbar has three passports and an irrelevant PhD and finally is doing what he was meant to be doing. His family in Toronto and writing practice are his two pillars, He has published in various journals including McGill Street, Parchment, Reform Jewish Quarterly.  Recently, his poem, What We need Beyond the Pale, appeared in the Poems in Response to Peril: An Anthology in Support of Ukraine, with proceeds going to PEN Ukraine and his poem Spatial Relations was selected for the League of Canadian Poets’ Poetry Pause.

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