The Raven, Never Flitting

© 2010 bridges association this story was known to all who came to our little synagogue in Israel to pray that wondrous day of Yom Kippur, the highest of the High Holy Days. It was a small group of parishioners, but not a cohesive one. There were two old ladies, one estranged from her husband, and one a widow, who never prayed in the synagogue any other day of the year. The estranged husband was in the men’s section; his grudge-bearing wife was behind the curtained partition, in the women’s section. In the men’s section there were also two people who never appeared any other time of the year. One was a man the children called “the monster man” because his eyebrows were grown together, his buck teeth protruded out of his protracted jaw, and his nose and lips looked as though they were twisted out of shape. No one knew whether or not he lived alone. There were people, an odd-looking woman or two and an occasional man, seen slipping in and out of his run-down house. But like the master of the house, they moved about furtively and spoke with no one. The second yearly male visitor was a short man who kept his mouth slightly open at all times and had a permanent wondering smile about him. He was seen regularly with his trio of small dogs, each of whom had a sharp high-pitched bark. The small man would put his small dogs on the sliding-pon, one by tHe raVen, neVer FLitting