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Enjoy.

Ben

This Week It’s Blood Oranges

Every Wednesday at the competing Russian
fruit stalls on opposing corners, I search
the lugs for a special price. One week
it’s seedless grapes, the next, tiny apricots.

At home in the drawer the stainless steel
knife—“never needs sharpening!”—
lies in wait for the bag of Blood Oranges,
this week’s special purchase, practically a give-away.

I slice them thin, thin, spread them out
flat on the plate, as suddenly they remind me
of human bodies lying on a highway
blocking all the roads leading to Gush Katif.

From the bright kitchen, my hopeless paring,
our great enterprise, scattered once again.
Settled deep in every fruited Jew-heart—
the secret blue corner when pricked, bleeds orange.

The Color Orange

Has it returned only to the fruit

of God’s Creation? In Hebrew,

the meaning of the color orange

has always been disengaged

from the fruit. Never any need

for a Jew to remove a Jew.

Only in the groves, greenhouses,

and synagogues do we resign

a word from its meaning.

Zionism. The Army. A color.

In time for the next election.