Repentance is Re-Creation

Repentance requires recreation;

the fact it’s possible implies

that within every person lies

the power of his liberation.

The shofar sounds reflect the fact

that all of us are free to be

what we should be, our jubilee

occurring every time we act

with the freedom we are given,

teqiah and shevarim-truah

proclaiming that when we are truer

to ourselves we’ll be forgiven.

Repentance is what we must “make,”

aseh, as in creation and

the mishkan, as we understand

that all of us can undertake

the process of creation when

we have allowed our God to dwell

within us, so what was unwell

is well within us, once again.

About the Author

Gershon Hepner is a poet who has written over 25,000 poems on subjects ranging from music to literature, politics to Torah. He grew up in England and moved to Los Angeles in 1976. Using his varied interests and experiences, he has authored dozens of papers in medical and academic journals, and authored "Legal Friction: Law, Narrative, and Identity Politics in Biblical Israel." He can be reached at gershonhepner@gmail.com.