Torah reading (the narrative of the individual soul)

There’ll be no end of the cycle until the round ceases
and we’re left with only now — tōra — nûn —
the cycle demands we wander in golus, in exile with the Hebrews,
with Moses who drew us from desolation in Egypt the narrow place.

Moses, doomed to arise, throw off Egyptian robes,
crack Pharaoh’s magicians over the head with this staff,
lead his stiff-necked people 40 years in the wilderness —
never himself to behold the allotted land.

And this is the Torah, the turning, the holy superstructure
of a created universe. On the second day the land
was set aside for his people — not for Moses.

But on the second day the land was also set aside only for him,
all within him, holiness contained the multitudes brought
to that promised land, continuously reborn as light, darkness, Eden.

8/27/05