Preface:
When the war between Israel and Hamas begins, Orpheus and Eurydice are in Israel near the border of Gaza at Eretz Crossing. They have people caught in the middle on both sides of the Wall. We all know the story of Orpheus and Eurydice from Greek mythology. We know what happened to them in ancient times, but few of us have followed them to Gaza in present time. An attack on a civilian population brings retaliatory war, and the tragic love story replays itself. A viper bites Eurydice on the heel, and she falls. She is taken to Hades, the underworld, and held as a hostage in the tunnels beneath Gaza.

1.
While trying to sleep on a plastic chair underground, Eurydice contemplates other wars and her fate as a hostage. She wonders why Helen is considered the cause of the Trojan War, even though she is merely a beautiful object passed between men of Greece and Troy. They use her as an excuse to indulge in their passion for savagery and discontent at not being able to wholly subsume women into their own sense of being. No matter how much they take away women’s autonomy, there is still a part of women that remains separate from them. This makes them angry.

though women they often deplore,
for Helen they would start a war,
these Greek and Trojan troubadours.

abducted like Persephone,
Helen the cause for setting free
men’s self-indulgent savagery,

a catalyst for argument,
of men’s inherent discontent.
objectified, a pretty face,

and yet the war is her disgrace,
though stripped of her autonomy,
hostage of male economy,

bitterly blamed for tragic strife,
a bystander to her own life,
a prize, a token, someone’s wife.

2.
Pro-Palestinian protesters at UCLA asked for supplies for their encampment and requested “no bagels.” While there may have been good reasons for demanding “no bagels,” the irony is inescapable. At the University of Chicago, United for Palestine made a list of “updated supply needs” that included HIV tests, morning-after birth control, dental dams, Vaseline, and “behind the ear mask buffers” to take the pressure off the ears of protesters complaining that they have to wear face-masks for extended periods. I’m not sure how protesters needing these items for survival would last even one day in Gaza under Hamas rule.

more missiles falling on my grave,
Iran is bombing Tel Aviv
after Israel’s preemptive strike

for the American Third Reich;
assassinations with a gun
of state lawmakers just for fun,

a huge military parade
of tanks too heavy to be weighed,
destroying DC city streets,

made just for cars and people’s feet.
there are too many fronts of war,
and I’m no longer keeping score.

I hear what’s happening up there
outside the tunnels in the air,
another dreadful Gazan day

of starving, bombs, the disarray
of blown-up children’s body parts—
one more American assault

on Jewish people—it’s their fault,
of protesters who hate my guts,
a Jew who doesn’t bring cold cuts

but only bagels they won’t eat,
reactionary Jewish wheat—
and Jewish bagels make them sick

though they’re not antisemitic
and will accept bread, doughnuts, toast,
communion wafers, holy ghost.