For the past few weeks I have been walking around in a daze. The terrible tragedy of Leiby Kletzky’s death feels like a constant loss wherever I turn. Last Shabbos a neighbor’s nine-year-old boy came to pick up his little sister from our house. And he looked exactly like the picture of Leiby. I felt tears spring suddenly to my eyes. Not on Shabbos, I warned myself. Do not cry on Shabbos in front of all of your children while you are serving dessert. But I felt like I was choking, like my heart was in my throat. Like I could feel somehow another mother’s heart shattering across the ocean. And I couldn’t stop thinking about it.
I don't know why. Usually it takes me a day or two to digest an awful story in the news. Sometimes it only takes me an hour, or just a few minutes. But these past few weeks have been different for some reason. Maybe because I have children that are around Leiby’s age. Maybe because I worry when my children are even a minute late, and I can so readily feel the agony of a mother whose child will never come home.
But what is taking my breath away lately is how the summer sun can still shine in the shadow of such loss. I cannot comprehend it. How can the sky be such a startling shade of blue on a morning like this? How can the branches of the olive tree reach so majestically upwards, cradling tiny, colorful birds who continue to sing as if no one is crying? As if a nation’s heart isn’t broken? As if a child has not just disappeared forever? How could the world just continue this way with its stunning sunsets and dawns full of hope?
I wanted the sky to turn black, for a storm to surround us for just a moment so that the loss would be mirrored back to us. How could we all just go on?
And then I got stuck in the "if onlys." It was a futile attempt to try to turn back time. If only Leiby wouldn't have gone to camp that day. If only he wouldn't have had a dentist appointment. If only he had asked someone else for directions. If only someone would have found a way to rescue him. If only we could have somehow heard him before all was lost. If only his death hadn't been so gruesome…
Run! Run! I wanted to scream at the photos. Why, oh why, didn't you run?
I started thinking like this when I visited Yad Veshem too. I looked at the photos of "life before" the destruction of European Jewry, and I was shocked by how normal life looked in those photos. The routines of work and shopping and raising children. The way those streets and those towns were so deeply embedded in our people like our own homes. The beloved shuls, the holy leaders, the way no one could believe that the hard times wouldn't pass.
And I stood staring into one of the black and white photos when suddenly it hit me. That young mother looked just like me! Different clothes, different background. But there was something in her eyes that I know. The smile that rose from within her as she held her children's hands in a marketplace in a time and place so very far away but yet so close to me somehow. What happened to her? I wondered, and the "if onlys" began. If only they all would have left as soon as the warnings of danger began. If only they knew how terrible the future would be. Run! Run! I wanted to scream at the photos. Why, oh why, didn't you run?
And the "if onlys" filter into my own personal losses too, when a loved one lost consciousness before saying goodbye. If only I would have arrived sooner. If only I would have stayed in America when I first got married, I would have had more time with her. If only she would have told me that she forgave me for moving so far away. If only she would have said good bye. If only.
On Tisha B'Av the depth and the pain of all our losses fill the very air that we breathe.
Tisha B'Av is the day when the birds of Jerusalem do not sing at dawn. The sky is not cloudy but it looks like it is on the edge of weeping, as if light itself is too much to carry. On Tisha B'Av the depth and the pain of all our losses fill the very air that we breathe. I can feel the weight of thousands of years of “if onlys.” If only we wouldn’t have cried for no reason in the desert. If only we would have done teshuva when the first Temple, in all its untainted holiness, was still standing. If only we had learned our lesson and become who we were supposed to be when the Second Temple was in our midst. If only we could have it all back.
The Sages tell us that there hasn’t been a true blue sky in Jerusalem since the Temple was destroyed. We don’t even know what we are missing. That is how far we are. Everything truly beautiful we have lost. Our center, our place where we could come close to God is gone. We wonder where and how we will find comfort when loss follows loss like the relentless waves of the ocean, pulling us under. Until we can no longer breathe, until we are fighting for air.
Until we are somehow pulled towards the one remaining Wall of His broken, empty Palace. Until we can all stand before that Wall and wonder how we can go on when a Father cannot find His children. When there is no longer a Home to bring them to.
If only we could really cry today. We are waiting by the door, knocking with the last of our prayers. If only You could hear the cries of those who don’t know how to cry. Please let us in. We are Your children, and we want to come home. If only it could be today.
(26) Jerry, July 27, 2012 1:32 PM
This story made tears come to an old iron workers eyes.
(25) Hannah, July 4, 2012 9:01 PM
How beautiful this article. How meaningful and how very touching. Thank you so much.
(24) Dena, August 10, 2011 7:59 PM
A Bit Late
Excellent article. "If only" I would have received it on Tisha B'av (and not motzei 10 Av) it would have made my Tisha B'av even more meaningful!
(23) Michele, August 9, 2011 8:30 PM
WOW!! VERY TOUCHING!! JUST WANT TO CRY!!
(22) chana, August 9, 2011 7:51 PM
I know what you mean
I had the same experience; every time I would see a little boy resembling Leiby, I'd get a stab of pain in my heart.
(21) eva, August 9, 2011 7:37 PM
Beautiful and moving, thank you.
It made me cry. So true. If only Moshiach would come.
(20) Sivan, August 9, 2011 6:59 PM
beautiful article
(19) Anonymous, August 9, 2011 5:47 PM
thank you for such a beautiful article.
(18) Anonymous, August 9, 2011 3:50 PM
"Tisha B'Av is the day when the birds of Jerusalem do not sing at dawn." Is that a poetic line or a fact? Beautiful article!
(17) Anonymous, August 9, 2011 3:26 PM
this is deeper than anything I have read. It is so close to our hearts,we feel the heaving sobs and feel the hot tears. I am sure Hashem does ,too. The end of golus is so close..we can almost touch it !
(16) Anonymous, August 9, 2011 10:49 AM
Beautifully written. Very expressive of the feeling of today... Tisha B'Av.
(15) Laya, August 9, 2011 4:22 AM
Yes...
...if only. If only I could know the right words to say or the best right action to take. If only the best words would spring forth in prayer. If only we would give each other the benefit of the doubt and if only we would give more charity. If only we could end world hunger. May all our prayers for good be answered. Thank you for sharing your heart in this article.
(14) Harold E. Brown, August 9, 2011 2:05 AM
IF ONLY
Yea! I just don't understand. Why,why,why?
(13) Anonymous, August 9, 2011 1:05 AM
beautiful
beautiful article
(12) Anonymous, August 8, 2011 9:19 PM
this is a truly beautiful article, and i feel so lucky to have read it before tisha b'av. thank you for helping me connect with the loss of our people.
(11) Anonymous, August 8, 2011 6:55 PM
Thank you for your article
You so eloquently described what I and so many others are experiencing. Thank you for relating, and thank you for your beautiful words. Hashem should comfort the Kletsky family, and all of us with them. We must beg with all our kochos for the geula.
(10) Anonymous, August 8, 2011 4:57 PM
If Only
This is a touching piece. I just wanted to make one important correction. In addition to the Western Wall we also have the Southern Wall.
(9) Shulamis Charlop, August 8, 2011 4:56 PM
excellent!! thank you
(8) Donna Perel, August 8, 2011 2:12 PM
If only.........
All of us must live with if only in our hearts. Don't wait to say thank you or I love you. Let us try to express our love for our fellow Yid whether that Yid is a family member, a member of our shul, or a member of our extended community. When the Almighty sees us working together even without tragedy then perhaps we will merit the final Geulah!
(7) Anonymous, August 8, 2011 11:54 AM
IF ONLY.... more people would read your wonderful article!
(6) Neil, August 8, 2011 10:42 AM
How to help
What can one person do to help in this question because it MUST NEVER happen again
ann, August 9, 2011 10:26 AM
what can YOU do?
Just be a better person... a little bit each and every day.
(5) Kepha and Myriam Bradley, August 7, 2011 10:21 PM
If Only
This is how most of us feel especially at the way innocents are treated today, it is become a terrible world we live in and all the indications are that it will only get worse. But you what? We truly believe that God is here and He hears our prayers. If, as we believe that He lives within us then it is up to each of us to shione His light into a dying world. We have seen His Hand at work in our lives and in the lives of others and we trust in Him. Despite the pain, despite the losses, despite the hunger, sickness, disease and violence, He is watching over us and His perfect Will will come to pass. We cannot see or know what God does but we can experience the same trust that Avraham, Issac, and Jacob did, along with all those who followed them, and we can make this world a better place. Yes we must mourn at times and at times it will seem so dark that no light shines, but we know this for a fact, that when these moments occur that is when our Father is at work within us, if we let Him be. Chazak, Chazak, v'nit, chazek! "Be strong, be strong, and together, we will, be strengthened. Kepha and Myriam.
(4) Anonymous, August 7, 2011 6:56 PM
Shabbos was not the same
How true and yet painful...and painful it was this past Shabbos as my sister an i left Mom's apartment and while we walked down we no longer met a young man and his son who would always say Gut Shabbos while on their way up to the 6th floor on their return from shul...yes, the Kletsky's moved and the building will never be the same and neither our lives.
(3) ruth housman, August 7, 2011 5:27 PM
The Door In The Wall
There is a story by H.G. Wells by this title and I am thinking about the reverbs with this loving, anguished article. I believe there are cracks, and that is how the light gets in, and I also believe that there are doors that do open for us all, call them new windows on the world, on a vision that is about more, about the more in love, or amore itself. We have all suffered, long years in the desert, even after the Promised Land and in the Promised Land, but there is still a Promise to be realized, and that has to do with a Messianic Future and I feel it's coming. I really do. This story will draw in all mankind, and will surely put the kind back into mankind, and will deeply involve Jerusalem. Cry the Beloved Country, and all countries suffering from terrible oppression and apparent desertion. Where is G_d in all this carnage, in all this suffering? Perhaps G_d never left us, and perhaps there is a cosmic story yet to be told, and messengers among us. I need to believe this. One child, just one, represent a multitude, represents us all. One tragedy envelops an entire world. Because he is us. We are a nation called Jews, and we are a nation called the World and universe is: one verse. I have a dream, and it's an elusive and an allusive dream that we will all hold hands together one day, around the world G_d is everywhere, and we are in the Temple. We never left and we were never abandoned.
Anonymous, August 9, 2011 12:47 AM
How beautiful your commentary was...three weeks after this tragedy in Boro Park, I had a terrible, sleepless night...haven't we all? However, a beautiful message from a Rav in Passaic held solace for me. This one sweet , little boy united Klal Yisrael --an all over the world connection that let us see what HaShem wants of us. HaShem wants one thing --HE WANTS US TO LOVE AND RESPECT EACH OTHER. IT'S SO CLEAR AND SIMPLE..WE MUST WORK ON IT EVERYDAY AND NOT WAIT FOR TRAGEDIES TO MOVE US ALONG.
(2) Anonymous, August 3, 2011 10:04 AM
So, so beautiful. Thank you.
(1) Brooke Remmert, August 2, 2011 9:54 PM
If only
This is very beautiful and moving; echoing my inner thoughts this day.