Ismail and Yitzhak Are Half-Brothers

October 3, 2016

Dear Subscriber:

Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. This week’s theme is peace and brotherly love, in honor of the fact that Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and Muharram, the Muslim New Year, fall just one day apart.

Today’s poem is a New Year’s plea for peace between Muslim and Jew.

I welcome comments on my poems at http://nicholasgordon.blogspot.com.

Yours,

Nick Gordon

Ismail and Yitzhak are half-brothers,

Raised by different, sometimes hostile mothers,

But joined in ancestry by one great man –

Their father, Ibrahim, or Abraham.

So close they are, and yet so far apart!

Their enmity a defect of the heart.

For families ought to love, and not to fight.

But each, aggrieved, is sure that he is right.

Their New Years are this year almost in sync,

Which is more meaningful than you might think.

For though in both the hatred might run deep,

None would willing sow what they might reap.

And so this accident of New Year dates,

If seized by them to harmonize their fates,

Clarifies the compromise that sits

So clearly on the table of their wits,

And realigns the borders of their fear

To resurrect the hopes that both hold dear.

Oh, what a life for both might then ensue!

The dreams of plenty coming into view!

As brothers their old brotherhood renew

In one new year for Muslim and for Jew!

© by Nicholas Gordon

Hear or watch me recite this poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/ismail.html. For more poems about nationality or race, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/racepoems.html .

This week’s theme: Peace and Brotherly Love.

October 3: Ismail and Yitzhak Are Half-Brothers