New Life is Rising: A New Prayer for Tu B’shvat

Cover-image-Micah-Bazant-2016-Tu-bshvat

A New Life is Rising Image by JVP Artist Council member Micah Bazant
A New Life is Rising Poem by JVP Rabbinical Council member Rabbi Brant Rosen

In the Jewish calendar, this Sunday marks Tu B’Shvat, the Jewish new year of trees! It is a time to celebrate the earth and the cycle of seasons and some draw in connections between the root causes of climate change, racism, Islamophobia, and occupation.

Download the Tu-B’Shvat Haggadah: A New Life is Rising
Print the image: A New Life is Rising
Download JVP’s past Tu-B’Shvat Haggadah: Trees of Reconciliation
Download the Leader’s Guide: A Tu-B’shvat Seder for Healing and Reparation

 

New Life is Rising

New life is rising.
In dark warm earth it unfolds.
Surging up through tangled roots.
eyes blinking in the widening light,
pulled by the inevitability of liberation.
New life is stirring.
Can’t you feel the blood coursing once more
through awakened hearts?
Can’t you see the crowd slowly gathering on street corners?
Don’t you hear the voices whispering
it’s time for the world
to be reborn anew?
New life is returning.
Sprouting through cracks in the concrete,
blooming out of villages long buried
and homes demolished.
Coming back to what was lost
but never truly forgotten.
Like the almond blossoms spreading across the hills;
like the olive trees standing steadfast in rocky soil,
new life is rising.
And soon, so very soon
the land will open its arms
to welcome you home.

 

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