Women’s liberation rally in Miami, 1972. (Abbas/Magnum Photos)
the oppressed are your chosen –
their cries
hymns of praise to
the source of liberation.
whenever you hear our sad
psalms of despair, the
dirges that affirm that
persecution is our destiny,
turn us
show us the arc of history
that bends inevitably
toward justice.
open our eyes to
the graveyards of nations
whose oppression has
rebounded upon them
whose insatiable desire was
their final ruination.
help us to understand the source
of our true power –
not in the flame of human cruelty that
inevitably flickers and dies,
but in the inexhaustible fire
that burns in the hearts
of all who struggle
to be free.
Yedid Nefesh 