Tetzaveh
12/25/2010Exodus Poems
You shall further instruct the Israelites to bring you clear oil of beaten olives for lighting, for kindling lamps regularly. Aaron and his sons shall set them up in the Tent of Meeting, outside the curtain which is over the Ark of the Pact, to burn from evening to morning before Adonai. (Exodus 27:20-21)
Lost in Translation
You might miss it in translation.
It’s only a sound after all,
an echo, unrelated in meaning.
Tetsaveh.
Teitatsav.
But those who sat by fires
listening with an intensity
that might save them
from the uncertainty
of darkness and wild beasts,
did they remember
the young girl who stood,
watching from afar,
frightened, sly
or both,
waiting for the right moment
to step forward
(timing is everything)
to say:
Shall I go and call for you
a Hebrew nurse
to suckle the child?
So much was hanging in the balance.
Did they wonder,
as I do,
whether that girl,
grown now,
a prophet in her own right,
did they wonder
whether she wept
when her brother Aaron
stepped forward
to kindle the light
of clear beaten oil
that would burn
before the Lord
for all time?