This Is Poetry, This Is Torah

by septemberbells

Summary:

Little Ash watches Uriel as it watches Freydie light the Shabbat candles. This, he thinks, is poetry. This is Torah.

Little Ash watches Uriel as it watches Freydie light the Shabbat candles. This, he thinks, is poetry. This is Torah.

After those harsh weeks on the ocean, without proper things for Shabbos, they're all settled into a tiny kitchen together, Uriel and Little Ash and Rose and Essie and, of course, the Shulmans, and some of their neighbors, whose names Little Ash didn't bother to learn.

His chevrusa's eyes gleam in the candlelight, that sweet jewel light of knowledge that carries the learning it pursues always for its betterment, that they both know they'll do together in the morning again. Each week, Shabbos morning is no different — there is shul, there is leyning. There is hope. They will study together for all of their days like this, in the shul, in their corner of the bookshop, in the Union halls because Little Ash can't leave well enough alone when he sees sin.

Uriel doesn't mind, not really. Ever since it became more human, more aware of human struggle, it cannot abide injustice against the worker. When you organize with the Unions, even when your neighbors and all of the workers own the factory where they work, there is another injustice to correct.

Little Ash and Uriel use their powers in small ways here, wherever they can. The struggle deserves all the support they can get. And every week, at the dinner table, they come back, and they light the candles, and they say the prayer, poetry in perpetuity.