i
God creates the Heavens and the Earth
and sees the desolatation of the universe
and looks into infinite darkness
and utters: Let there be light.
ii
Before Moses dies
God gives him a poem
to share with the people.
*
The poem calls Heaven and Earth
to bear witness to God’s words.
The poem speaks of how God took Israel
from a desolate land
and it speaks of God’s battle against wickedness
throughout time.
iii
This poem that Moses shares
follows the nature of poems,
encapsulating the vastness of everything
into the smallness of life.
A desolate universe
becomes a desolate people.
The Heaven and Earth that hear God speak
against the Cosmic Darkness
become the Heaven and Earth that hear Moses speak
against wickedness—
against the darkness that people make.
iv
Now consider how the Rabbis call the Torah a poem.
Of course this is so:
it is the writing through which all there is
enters our lives
and the writing through which our small lives
encompass all that there is.
v
Then to accept Torah
is to accept the responsibilty of poetry:
the responsibility of holding up a whole universe
within a life.
___
Shabbat Shalom,
Abe
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