FOUR POEMS

Guilt Offering

            if you fear you ate forbidden meat (hooves not split nor cud chewed)

            take a ram without blemish and money for the sons of Aaron

because I might have possibly there’s a chance

I tasted flesh that is other

I feed the sons shamefaced coins

blood splashed

on altar sides

they speak of your mercy

letting me live

as if it’s not in my hands

around my hands is rope

they taught me in school

constraint is freedom

only carry when you permit me to carry

and do not wander beyond the fine wire

wrapping this city

Guilt Offering

(I did I tasted his skin

and traced his skin

pressed my ear to his skin

breathed in his skin

witnessed his skin

his christened skin

with all the senses you gave me)

Sin Offering

you do not want

the blood of my bulls

as the verse says

the blood in my bowls

for I harbor tides

of wicked

was just last night uncovered

with intention

GRAIN Offering

I learned to knead dough on a farm by the Beara Peninsula where I was
the only Jew for miles and for the first time exotic I made elderflower
cordial built a scarecrow on the Sabbath I climbed Hungry Hill in the
Caha Mountains covered in mist and sheep and climbed waterfall rocks
till I reached the cairn at the summit this was the highest I had ever and
I came down drank cider ate crisps shared a bed with a French boy who
didn’t like to French kiss and hitched a ride home in the morning

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Alisha Kaplan is a poet who splits her time between downtown Toronto and a farm in Hillsburgh, Ontario. She is an editor for Narrative Magazine and her writing has appeared in Fence, DIAGRAM, Cosmonauts Avenue, Powder Keg, Carousel, and elsewhere.