GENESIS11........THE BELOVED AND I

Genesis 11 The Beloved and I

Thomas McElwain

Genesis 11

1 Now the whole earth was of one speech,

One language only within reach.

2 And as they journeyed from the east,

It happened they found unpoliced

A plain in Shinar's land and where

They settled down to living there.

3 Then they said to each other, "Come,

Let us make bricks and bake them some."

They had their bricks for stone, and they

Had asphalt for mortar and clay.

4 And they said "Come, let us build up

Ourselves a city, tower whose top

Is in the heavens, let us make

Ourselves a name and for our sake,

So that we're not scattered around

The surface of the whole earth's bound."



How many towers have I built around

The world! Quaint churches and retreats abound

Among the temples, synagogues and lodges,

Theologies syncretic and hodge-podges.

I make myself baked bricks instead of stone,

A thousand minute statutes that alone

Replace the sapphire glint of ten small words.

The worship of the creeping things and birds

Is more demanding than the Decalogue.

Although it keeps the worshipper in fog,

And mind caught up in myriads of things,

It lets me keep my human priests and kings.

Cast down my brick and asphalt palaces,

And give me humble houses where truth is.



5 But YHWH came down to see the city

And tower that men had built for pity.

6 And YHWH said "Now these are one people

Of one language and of one steeple.

And this is what they start to do,

And there is nothing to construe

An end to their hullabaloo.

7 "Come, let's go down there and confuse

Their language, and see what they choose

When they can't understand their neighbours'

Commands, complaints, comforts and labours."

8 So YHWH scattered them all abroad

Around the whole world for their fraud,

And they stopped building on the city.

9 Therefore its name, just to be witty,

Is called Babel, because there YHWH

Confused the whole world's language too,

And from there YHWH scattered them out

Over the whole world without doubt.



Was it in anger that You shattered speech

So that men could no longer talk to each

Man that he found on tower or bridge or street?

Speech once was like a crystal bright and sweet.

It gave such meanings that none now can know

So clearly and precisely that the slow

Could not mistake. Communication was

A perfect thing and worked as perfect does.

But then Your hand brushed from its pedestal

That splendoured, rainbowed, iridescent ball,

And left it splintered. It's no wonder that

All human speech is deaf and dumb and flat,

Chips shining in the sun and meaningless

Except to bring remembrance to Your dress.



10 This is the genealogy

Of Shem: Shem was a hundred. He

Sired Arphaxad two years after

The flood. 11 Then he did not defer

After Arphaxad, Shem lived still

Five hundred years, by Allah's will,

And had both daughters and more sons.

12 Aged thirty-five Arphaxad's guns

Produced Salah. 13 And after that

Arphaxad lived four hundred flat

And three years more and also bore

Daughters and sons in greater store.

14 And Salah lived for thirty years,

And sired Eber to dry his tears.

15 And after Eber, Salah stood

Four hundred and three years for good,

And more sons and more daughters too.

16 Well Eber lived to thirty-four

And sired Peleg, 17 And then lived more,

Four hundred thirty years, and yet

Sired sons and daughters rarely met.

18 Peleg lived thirty years, and then

Sired Reu. 19 Afterward again

Peleg lived two hundred and nine

Years more with daughters just as fine

As sons. 20 Reu lived thirty-two

Years, and sired Serug. 21 So Reu

Lived after that two hundred seven

With sons and daughters up to heaven.

22 Serug lived thirty years, and sired

Nahor. 23 And since he wasn't tired

Serug lived two hundred years more,

Produced daughters and sons therefore.

24 Aged twenty-nine years was Nahor

And sired Terah. 25 After were seen

Nahor's one hundred and nineteen

Years siring sons and daughters well.

26 Now Terah lived for seventy years,

And sired Abram, and truth to tell,

Nahor, and Haran without fears.

27 This is the genealogy

Of Terah: Terah lived to see

Abram, Nahor, and Haran, three.

And Haran produced Lot. 28 But he

Saw death before his father in

His native land, in Ur of the

Chaldeans, land of Terah's kin.

29 Then Abram and Nahor took wives:

The name of Abram's wife's Sarai,

And Nahor's wife, Milcah, contrives

To be daughter of Haran by

The father also of Milcah

And also father of Iscah.

30 But Sarai, barren, had no child.

31 And Terah took his son Abram

And grandson Lot, a little wild,

Who was the son of his Haran,

And Sarai, his daughter-in-law,

Son Abram's wife, and fled the law

Of Ur of the Chaldeans for

To go to Canaan, what is more,

They came to Haran and lived there.

32 So all the days of Terah were

Two hundred and five years, the span

Till Terah saw death in Haran.



I sit in Haran's mosque with its green dome

And make it, with my recitation, home.

What words in Arabic sound on my tongue

As I take in Your name to heart and lung.

Who knows where Terah lies, his great grandson

Already with his father's work long done

Lies buried there behind the grill and stone.

The prophets' children are not here alone.

What holy feet have pressed this ruined earth!

Now windy rain's mere spatter on its dearth.

The women gather at the running well.

A cripple hobbles past, and who can tell

Who else may whisper in this ancient place

Your names, Beloved, then pass without a trace.