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Abram’s Moonless Night

My veiled tears glide
Down a smile’s slope;
I hoist myself on fraying rope
That lifts me up with a pulley’s shake.
My heart pounds and waits
For remaining threads to break.

What do I grasp, for real?
This distant, indifferent God
Resides in another realm,
And given up the helm
Of boundless love
And taken a vacation from
The First of Creation.

I ponder in endless inquiry.
And dream of departing with Abram
On his lekh lekha.
I wonder what he saw,
What took his fright,
To the other side of his moonless night?

He heard a voice,
Inside or without.
It stopped him.

It stopped him.

Dizzying, perplexing, astonishing.
Perhaps the stars seemed closer
And the wind caressed his shoulders.
Miles from where he departed
With no clear markers ahead,
With fleeting remembrance,
Of what stayed behind
And nothing to gentle his trembling mind.

I love this man …
I never knew
What rushing winds passed through his liminal space.
So many years, I’ve sought his path
And dodged the Nameless Embrace.
Darkness covers my scars –
But Abram strode ahead
With miles of endless stars at his back
And hints of dawn
Emerging from heaven’s crack.

I stand on holy ground.
10,000 stars connect me
To a people unstuck in time.
I feel no closer to knowing,
But I know that world is mine.

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