I don’t like anything that seems too prescriptive or absolute, that has the you have to tone. And yet. I’m not the first one to talk about the kindness of strangers, the deep kindness possible from people you’ve never met.

Now that I am
Not Young
Not Even
Middle Aged
Now that I am
Sort of old
I can’t even say
Old without
An adjective or two
Not yet now that I am
somehow supposed to be
contemplating
considering
being honest about what matters
kindness is right up there
what does it mean
to be kind, open-hearted
to be right there
when your friend, when a stranger
when someone else
in big circumstances or small
when someone needs
another person
right there
just right there.

About the Series. Postcards for Hanukkah is a sequence of eight photo-poems by Matthew Septimus and Esther Cohen. Each day, for the eight days of Hanukkah, we will release a new postcard, which we hope give some light to you.