Tonight the third night
of counting the Omer
when in kabbalah we invoke
the heart of kindliness
the kindliness of father Avraham
the radiant heart of Yaakov his grandson
my friend Hank
who just last week turned eighty
was telling me how he had learned to read
sitting on his grandfather's lap
his mother's father
who had a shul in Philadelphia
where he was cantor
with a balcony for women
but no rabbi
"if anyone had anything to say
they just stood up and said it"
I suspect
this "anyone" applied chiefly to men
Hank was almost in tears remembering
these moments of his childhood
but forgot to say
if it was Hebrew or English
that his grandfather
was teaching him to read