Vox Populi
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Donna Spruijt-Metz: Birthday with Empty Hands
—after Psalm 136 verses 10-16
Today is our firstborn’s birthday—and you
are missing the party.
You’ve been pulled away on
death’s urgent business.
Yet when the membrane that divides us
is at its thinnest—
and I am very quiet, I feel
your hand reaching out—
stretching to cross—straining
to breach the sticky miasma of between.
Is there a kindness in this strange proximity?
Perhaps. The birthday party has been
postponed—it gets dark and rough here
on the wilderness side of the membrane.
I am using one of your pens. I am holding them all
hostage. Come back and fetch them.
~~~~
Copyright 2025 Donna Spruijt-Metz
Donna Spruijt-Metz‘s books include To Phrase a Prayer for Peace (Wildhouse Publishing, 2025). She’s an emeritus professor, MacDowell fellow, rabbinical school drop-out, and former classical flutist. She gets restless.
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Lovely indeed. And sad, sad.
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Donna knows that the sticky passage between life and death sits gossamer thin. This is the liminal way of knowing that mystics and poets envision when they attempt their crossing. Brilliant with the pens as guides to passage, the poem cries out; and like other great poems, the ending is not an end.
For those of us who grieve, we face this situation: life and death working on each other, again and again.
thanks for voicing this tender evocation of the world. It reminds me of Martin Buber’s I and Thou.
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What a brilliant comment, Jim. You’ve made my mind go places it’s never been before. Thank you.
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“Come back and fetch them.”
Ohhh. This dare. This wish.
Sending you love, Donna
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thank you dear poet
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So beautiful and affecting. I love what you do with the pens–that last urgent wish, in spite of the felt presence of the absent one, the almost acceptance of the new relationship of the living and the dead.
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Mijn lieve Donna — how I admire this. And how each line of this poignant poem resonates in me. Dank je.
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What a moving elegy about the fragility and intensity of the interconnection between love and loss. “Is there a kindness is this strange proximity?” The poem offers, with one of those pens, that there is. Thank you.
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Thanks, Phil.
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I try to avoid hyperbole when it comes to the work of a poet, but I must say: I am staggered and grateful for this poem, and in awe of the writer for her extraordinary skill. Not one word too many. Not one word too few. A heartfelt brava, Donna! Thank you for being able and willing to write this one (and, as always, thank you Vox Populi for putting such fine work before me.)
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Thanks, Annie!
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Wow!
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Psalm 136-10-16 describes God striking down Egypt’s firstborn and then leading the chosen people through the wilderness.
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What a lovely elegy. The contrast between the birthday party and the remembrance of the man is powerful.
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