Portrait of the Rabbi as an Artist Explaining Another Artist’s Portrait
I stand in the gallery
pointing out to them
the play of light and dark,
lines curved and straight,
cubes and angles,
all alluding to the Artist’s ardor,
as I coax their adoration.
Some half doze and politely yawn.
Others dismiss with candor
the painted objects of veneration.
And others get entranced
with how He conjures up the dawn.
Dan Ornstein is a rabbi at Congregation Ohav Shalom and a writer in Albany, N.Y. This poem was inspired by a Torah teaching he learned from Rabbi Gordon Tucker while Ornstein was a rabbinical student at the Jewish Theological Seminary.
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