A Kinnah (Lamentation) for 5785

Hashem – it is too painful
for our poor human hearts to hold
Please remember for us
Thou before whom all is revealed

Remember the pain of Eve knowing she has sinned
Do not forget Adam’s blame of his beloved wife
It is too painful for our hearts to hold

Remember the horror of Noah and his family
As they emerged to a world vanished and drowned
Too much pain for our human hearts

Remember the desperate desire of barren women
To hold in their arms that one small child
Too much heartbreak for us to face

Remember the shock of our mother Sarah
At her husband’s act, she cried and died
We cannot enter that excruciating moment

Remember Rachel’s death in childbirth
Do not forget Leah’s loneliness
It is too much for us to bear

Remember Joseph so cruelly betrayed
Years alone, a searing injustice
We cannot imagine such torture

Remember the Israelites groaning in Egypt
Forget not their bitter cries
Our ancestors’ suffering embitters our hearts

Remember the punishment You gave without mercy
Forty years of grim wandering, digging our own graves
This day is too full of grief to endure

Remember for us our two Temples
Shattered because we did not prove worthy
We revile our flawed selves, created by You

Remember for us the Spanish massacres
and exile to lands that were not home
We cannot contain the cold fire of that pain

Remember for us all the pogroms
Marauding enemies who saw us as inhuman
Hashem our memories cannot store this history

Remember for us the German destruction
Do not forget how we were decimated
We cannot look at it directly and live

Remember for us all those who died in the State
trying to protect our Jewish home
When we count the numbers, our wails never end 

Remember for us that wrecked Simchat Torah
our callous enemies breached our weakened gates
Our hearts are as water, our eyes run red.

Remember for us our hostages, gone and alive
O L-rd please, please redeem them
Daily they are a dagger in our hearts. 

Hashem our hearts are limited and human,
our minds unable to keep all the images.
We look to You to remember for us.
Please end the pain, bring us our Geula