Dear Readers,
Parshat Noach is about destruction. It is about a God that has made an error in creation, for people can be evil and they can be cruel. God decides that God's creation should be destroyed so God instructs Noach to build an ark. The rabbis teach us that Noach never questions God's decree, as opposed to Avraham, who questions God when God is about to destroy S'dom. It took Noach many years to complete the ark, and during that entire time never do we hear of Noach asking God to change God's mind.
Forces of destruction come from many directions...They come from natural events; from water and fire, earthquakes and tsunamis, and then there is the destruction that humans wreak on one another.
For this piece I started by imagining the morning that the flood began, thinking about those innocent people who were going to be destroyed that day, for how can children possibly be evil? Before the clouds began, could the innocents have imagined their terrible end?
Some stories never change; only the surrounding circumstances and characters change.
I've added an epilogue, taken from this parsha, to complete this poem, because we never lose hope.
We pray for better times, for more peaceful times.
To conclude this post, I have spent time learning with a wonderful teacher these past years. At his Thursday evening classes, he and his students offer a L'chayim. I've started to do that with the classes that I teach, for life is so precious. So fill a glass with water, or another beverage....coffee, tea, juice. Raise it now....raise it high and say.
L'chayyim, to life.
Leann
One Still Morning
The morning was quiet,
only the sound of a mourning dove softly cooing,
And the raw caw-caw of a raven in the distance
On that morning,
that sunny morning
he couldn’t imagine
that murderous clouds
were approaching
On that morning,
that still morning,
that everyday morning,
she couldn’t imagine
that heinous winds were about to blow her away.
A child stirred under his pilled blanket
A swaddled infant cried loudly in her crib,
while another clutched a much loved stuffed bear
They, in childhood innocence couldn’t imagine
the storm clouds multiplying
fat and full above their heads
As she sipped her morning drink she heard the bang of the storm
pounding her roof,
breaking through her windows.
As he sat on the edge of his bed
He heard the first drops
hushed at first,
but growing louder and louder
like merciless thunder,
breaking over his head,
surrounding him.
He held his hands over his ears,
hoping to stifle the noise.
She ran to the door
slamming it,
blockading it after looking outside,
hoping to hide.
The babe stopped her tears and lay silent.
The child bundled under her blanket,
clutching at her ragged bear.
The storm magnified and multiplied,
as if it was a giant octopus
intent on its prey.
There was no escape,
no safe room to shield from the deluge.
As the rooms filled they could
only swim against the tide
until they were carried away.
The storm raged on
and what was just that morning a village
disappeared
into an abyss that looked more like fire than water.
All that remained was the stuffed bear
with a question in his stone cold eyes,
for he could not understand what had transpired
and why just he remained.
After it was over,
after the storm had passed by,
on a day that was no longer beautiful,
no longer an ordinary day,
the quiet returned,
and it was truly,
truly
too quiet;
all that was heard was the coo of the mourning dove
and the caw-caw of the raven as it flew high above,
far away from the destruction.
We are waiting for the rainbow.
Still.
*******
Epilogue, because we must end with hope.
The LORD smelled the pleasing odor, and the LORD said to Himself: “Never again will I doom the earth because of man, since the devisings of man’s mind are evil from his youth; nor will I ever again destroy every living being, as I have done.
So long as the earth endures,
Seedtime and harvest,
Cold and heat,
Summer and winter,
Day and night
Shall not cease.”
Genesis 8:21,22
Other posts from Words Have Wings on Parshat Noach:
The Window
No Ark For the Extinct
עֹ֖ד כּל־יְמֵ֣י הָאָ֑רֶץ זֶ֡רַע וְ֠קָצִ֠יר וְקֹ֨ר וָחֹ֜ם וְקַ֧יִץ וָחֹ֛רֶף וְי֥וֹם וָלַ֖יְלָה לֹ֥א יִשְׁבֹּֽתוּ׃
Comments