Читать книгу The Scroll of Anatiya - Zoë Klein - Страница 7

If I were your wife I would hide my blush behind a veil of sky. I’d need no embroidered garment, no band of gold. 2And if you should look at my fingers and ask, “My love, with what shall I adorn these hands, these almond blossoms?” 3(for so I imagine your speaking), then I would say, 4“Carve for me your third eye, the one that shows you visions of the Lord, genuine from under your brow, and I shall wear it upon my finger. It is the gem with the most excellent clarity.”

5But fantasy is for the unworthy.

You must know that I am a desert nymph,

whoring with the foliage.

6The trees straighten up

in reverence to me.

7How I myself despise.

It is because of me that they become

brittle and chapped, those blameless sprouts.

8When no cloud offers respite,

and no rain quenches their wooden hearts,

it is because I have laid a curse upon them,

tainted their sap with my own.

9Hard-working ants march up to the spot

to investigate the sweet mingling

of girl-child and resin.

10Dear Father, water your garden!

Do not mind me as I lie among the sticks.

11Jeremiah is the companion of my youth,

and I am only his shadow’s shadow.

12Do not withhold the Heaven’s late showers

on account of such a forgotten dream,

such a forgettable dreamer as me.

13Josiah was eight years old when he became king, nearly twenty years before my birth. 14I imagine him then, as little and lean as I today, nestling himself into that wide golden throne. 15Sweet Josiah, noble and pure, love of your mother, Jedidah daughter of Adaiah descendent of David. She was named for the psalmist’s own son. 16Your father sacrificed unclean animals to chipped idols, pounded his breast in painted temples. 17You were old enough to remember when your father’s own courtiers murdered him and the people of the land did then massacre them. 18With the bloodied hands and thirsty eyes of wolves, they lifted you upon the chair. 19A people awaited your rulership, while you sadly consented to overcome your years. 20A shepherd from a little lamb was forged. O, your eight years must have seemed to you as eight branches of Temple light, filled with oil and set on fire! ~wrote Anatiya.

21You found a companion in Shaphan the scribe. He delivered you a message from on high. 22He proclaimed: “I have found a scroll of the Teaching in the House of the Lord!” 23And Shaphan read to you as Jedidah did when your childhood was still a gift. 24He read, “These are the words that Moses addressed to all Israel on the other side of the Jordan.” 25You did not stir, you barely blinked all the while he read, all through the night by a dim oil lamp. Your heart leapt when he read “O happy Israel!” and a moment later you wept when he read, “He buried him.” 26As he ended the scroll, in that tiny moment, the Lord showed the whole land to you. 27It was cringing and crying to you. You tore your garment, wept and stood. 28You trusted no man at that time, and so you sought the wisdom of a woman, the prophetess Hulda. 29Her husband was the keeper of the wardrobe, and he was knowledgeable in robing. But she was knowledgeable in disrobing. 30She knew to peel away the thick husks and see to the clear kernel of truth within. She showed you the word of the Lord ~wrote Anatiya.

31The Lord set you ablaze with anger toward those other altars. 32There was a fraction of Moses within you when you flared up against each and every wild golden calf. 33You hated the parade which tore with glitter-teeth at your carefully sown gardens, galloping through your royal orchards where the voice of God was known to stroll. 34There was a fraction of Noah within you when you invited the waters to purge the land. 35You ground the bones of the priests and burned them on their altars. 36You hewed down the incense stands and the shrines of the gates, turned Ashera and Ashtoreth into dust, demolished the Baals and the cubicles of male prostitutes. 37You burned the chariots of the sun and froze the fires of Molech, so that no child should be tossed into that raging pit. 38You melted molten images into precious rivulets until the land bled silver, copper, and fine gold.

39O beautiful Josiah, you turned to the Lord with all of your heart and soul and might. 40The Lord swore that no disaster should befall whilst your good eyes still shine. But it has been said that you will be slain before your time, plucked early from your place so that you should not see God’s wrath. 41But I shall see it, and I shall live it. O protect our righteous King Josiah that the day may not come! 42Hulda did not tell you all that she saw, Josiah. 43She knew your end and hid the words, “Beware the river Euphrates!” ~wrote Anatiya.

44The icy moon removed her hood,

thinking that she was alone. So small are we

to her that she mistakes us for empty space.

45You turn back the cover while you sleep

and I see your shoulder, round and bare,

luminous as the water’s moon-reflections.

46So unlike any man, Jeremiah,

you are dust of stars, ashes of the silvery moon.

47I have resolved to adopt you as my life,

and I offer you my presence

which shies away in love.

48I offer you my faint, vaporous presence,

that you might ever-suspect

you are fiercely loved.

49I tumble to you, an uprooted weed,

over undulating hills.

50Let us lie down in our weariness

and let my breath be a cover to you,

warm and sweet as a field

where you dream of sweeping trees

and silence.