Earth Etude for Elul 11 - It's Done, It's Not Done

by Judith Black

Our beautiful planet will survive and rehabilitate itself.

We will not.

Not the animals, not the insects, not the glaciers, not the poles.

Seeing one’s own extinction

Standing on that precipice

We still have a choice to make

Will I sink into the couch

Despair invading every pore

Weeping for the duration

Will I fight like hell

Pushing legislators and industry

Creating clean, healthy, just alternatives

Will I tend my garden

Caring and nurturing what remains

Sharing my carrots

Will I burrow into my soul

re-connecting with the spirit of love

turn into and radiate G-d’s love

Maybe it’s not done.

There are still choices

How will I continue to act out the divine until I can act no more?

Winner of the Oracle: Circle of Excellence, storytelling’s most coveted award, Judith’s been featured at The Montreal Comedy Festival, The National Storytelling Festival, The Smithsonian Institution, Hebrew University in Jerusalem, the National Art Museum in Cape Town, and NPR. She’s performed at over 10 CAJE conferences and explored B’nai Mitzvah, familial function and dysfunction, parenting, aging and end-of life, and in this past decade has moved her skills educate and activate around our climate crisis. She , most recently, is the winner of the National Storytelling Network 2022, Earth Up Conference slam. For more information about Judith’s work: www.storiesalive.com   storiesalive@gmail.com.