Standing and praying, a man in a black yarmulke.
His body rocks, swaying back and forth,
his lips moving, murmuring. My lips,
sealed as I watch from a nearby café table,
hands wrapped around a cup of coffee.
Its heat a small consolation.
How does he pray with such conviction?
Faith I want to claim but don’t know how.
Last month, when my student broke down
because her demented father carries a knife
and he thinks she’s conspiring against him, I advised her
where to get help and whispered they’re in my prayers.
To a friend whose tumors scythe his too-lean body—
what to say except I’m keeping him in my prayers.
Honestly, they’re in my thoughts. All day
and night. I worry so hard
my brain feels like it’s breaking. In bed, I lie awake,
curled on my side and hugging my knees.
Caring and hoping, are they the same
as bowing and praying? I gaze
at the man davening. What if I did that?
I lift the cup to my lips. The coffee is lukewarm.
A 2023 New Jersey Council on the Arts poetry fellow, Robin Rosen Chang is the author of The Curator’s Notes (Terrapin Books). Her poems have appeared in New Ohio Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Plume, and have been featured on Verse Daily. She was an honorable mention for the Spoon River Review’s Editor’s Prize and winner of the Oregon Poetry Association’s Poet’s Choice Award. She has an MFA from the Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. She lives in New Jersey and teaches writing at Montclair State University.
