I am
Let me be honest with you. I am seeking belonging with others like me, motley, multi, molting, malleable, marveling, moved to many not homogeny.
I am of continents and shifting tectonic plates. I am Motown groove born in Motortown. I am also of lands across vast ocean. I am of monsoon typhoons, roofs flying, rivers sweeping away home and hope. I am for the most part reared motherless, fatherless but grandmother-full. I am of walls bare of Christian iconography where others crumble under the weight of the Sacred Heart, the rosary and the Last Supper. I am of sweeping the floors with a broom, an implement that Rashi called a brocha in Masechet Sukkah I am collecting dirt into my private mountain, collecting secrets of converso hidin’. I am of cheating and sweeping secrets out, past portals that hold holy history. I am of forced naps on Saturday afternoons when everyone went to the movies. And when that day gave in to twilight, I am jealousy of grown-ups wrecking havoc on the cement with stilletos and wing-tipped brogues, lighting the night electric with tango, paso doble, rhumba and mambo.
I am call of prayer, my prayer. And I am of supplications in Spanish that was not quite Castilian not pure enough. I am of formulations of forgiveness, O mercy of the Almighty, Sovereign of the Universe. I am of talking to G!d, liberator from oppression, from my grandmother’s medieval whip liberated from American care packages. I am contradiction, of sitting every few steps when I got my period because my great grandmother said so. I am ward to one who asked forgiveness every year, of everyone she had ever wronged except me. I am Sinner, called as such, laughed at like her because Teshuva was what we did at a certain time of the year, year after y Asap ear. I am of tropical parades led by the Virgin Mary, beauty queens, pageant queens, but not your white clad Shabbat Queen. I am Girl hunched breathing still, eagle-eyed, steely calm watching while a butcher knife squeals on the sharpening stone to slit the throat of the neck of a life chicken. I am Girl watching blood spill to the earth. I am Girl shomrah to the boiling cauldron of water, mikvah for this former creature, my fingers itching for feather plucking, to pass it/her on to an Older Sister/Auntie/
Elder’s ministering salting hands. I am devotee to my flesh and blood Older Sister/Auntie/Elder, who from squawking life alchemized silken chicken soup sustaining, nourishing. My Shabbat Queen of the Kitchen Ruler of all Realms, dark-skinned, Pop-Eye brawned, brown Galoise glowing tip forever in her mouth closed glowing.
I am wonder at the teeming life under a stone upturned, wonder at the riot of bougainvillea rioting aThanks I wanna I hope I get the bove my Day head, wonder at blood red baby pomegranates granadillas, exploding grenades in carmine on my fingers and everywhere else. I am witness to rioting of noisy tafetta of alta sociedad, high society old new wealth against the ironed pressed fraying cotton of those who served us at home and would brush against me in public spaces. I am witness to rioting scattered by raining bullets aimed at those protesting and dismantling oppression. I am understanding that people don’t often say what they really mean. I am understanding that meaning is malleable: church meaning, ashram meaning, temple meaning, government meaning. Yet I am from heart straining to see shimmering air above - around - all around me me, notes sublime swirling spiraling during mystical longing. I am crisscrossing continents, cultures, calls to worship. I am of eyes closed, neck aligning with spine, noisy Ujaya breathing centering devoting. I am questioning, “I just don’t understand why.” I am learning. I am song. I am movement.
I am ‘not surrendering Wonder’ - Yirat Hashamayim - not to you, not to her, not to him, not to anybody, except to G!d/G!dess Umm within and in humanity. I am ear to ear smile, still gullible.
I am single sampaguita, fragrant yasmin, tiny thorny rose growing in a Bustelo can. I am plotting in vivid hues about change with devotees, allies and co-conspirators. I am not about tallit upon a suit. I am not about looking like, dressing like, sounding like you, eating like you. Because I am cilantro on Shabbat, noodles on Rosh Hashana, ube hamentashchen on Purim, bunuelos on Hanukkah - and Deepavali candles lining windowsill and roofs. I
I am living my life Jewishly yes, in the hybrid diasporic shatnez-challenging way as did my great great grandparents. best life live on after me. I am a Filipino American, brown, Jewish, scarred survivor of Upper West Side Jewish civility. I am what I was warned against by a Rabbi from whose lips frothed, “You are Filipino, female, and now you want to be formally Jewish? Do you want to be triple times marginalized.” I am Filipina-American, female, Jewish and even more, a global citizen, member of the global majority. In my professional life I am a Rabbi, ordained at JTS Class of 2015, Masters in Jewish Studies, a product of NYU Tisch School of the Arts BFA Film where while buried in the editing rooms, I learned the power of Story and Edit Edit Edit, the pianist Louis Horst’s counsel to Martha Graham for whom I danced. In my professional life, I am a Rabbi, a JEN Rabb Fellow at a congregation called Romemu I am one of 3 Rabbis at Romemu, Jewish life elevated, a community started by Rabbi David Ingber on the Upper West Side. I am more than certifiable indeed, Board Certified Chaplain by the Neshama Association of Jewish Chaplains. I am shoresh-extrapolating, medieval exegesis loving geek, unapologetically committed to song, meditation, movement, Toirah, the spiritual practice of growing equity and justice in our world. I am a woman who proudly identifies as a Jew of Color - when I have been told, why don’t we just pray together regardless of our differences. I am of different - textures, accents, a garland of motley flowers rather than one perfection of beautiful blossom. I am a small letter O, who bends the knee to the Eternal One with the large letter O, in all the ways that I am able walk through the world. I am teacher and student, and eternal student some more. I am understanding that multiple forms of oppression intersect, happen at once, within one person or one group’s identity as it does in me. I am soldier comrade alongside others fighting oppression. I am Many, no longer Alone as Jewish community tried their darnedest to convince me, dangling the promise of belonging in my face, in exchange for silence, erasure into oblivion, the perfect ger, silenced into their shalom bayit, as our exclusion drags us down into isolation andi illness - and the a sigh, “see? I told you so. You let them in…”
Yes, I am survivor of our own people’s muted shaded racism, sexism, classism, ableism, multiplicity of phobias, belief-grounded bigotry. I am Jewish Emergent from the shame of acting in concert and in relationship with those who ensnared my senses with mana of acceptance in a pea-soup continuum of inequity. I am survivor of addiction to inclusion then exclusion, to equality then inequality, toinsider-ness then outsiderness. I am serving where I have once been the one served. I am privilege and lack of privilege. I am warrior against the tyranny of a single narrative, of one way of being and being seen. I am a nudge to who, what, why, wherefore art thou Torah. And I am working to have my best life live on after me. To paraphrase the last page of Children’s Lertters to God. Dear God, I am doing the best I can.
Love, Mira
