call You to save me, to account for my soul.
49Do not stone me for my thirst!
Do not drop Your fists of hail upon me!
50Do not turn Your back on me, O Lord!
51I vow that no man will know me,
no man will know me, but the trees,
do forgive this palest of iniquities,
the desert trees will bear marks of my teeth
~wrote Anatiya.
52You are sitting on a flat stone in the valley
listening to the shining words of the Lord.
53They come to you strung together in furious poetry.
I stand by and gather handfuls of spilt syllables
which roll away like forgotten jewels,
round and smooth over the white face of sand.
54I wear them around my neck.
55Your hair is raven black, slick as feathers,
and the afternoon sunlight is reflected in your locks
as a glowing ring of amber light
that cascades gently over your shoulders.
56Your skin is a sheen over a shadow,
a bright over a dark.
57Should the dark side of the moon
surface with the bright, this would be your pallor.
58Your eyes are the first day of Creation.
In them, God separated the light from the darkness.
59God called the light “Eye,”
and the darkness God called “Iris.”
60Your lips are the deepening horizon.
61The blue veins on your wrists
are a perfect map of the rivers of Eden.
Here is Pishon and her sister Gihon,
winding up the length of your arm, side by side.
62And here branches Tigris and here branches Euphrates,
and here your lifeblood courses
from your upturned hand, a tiny Eden,
from hand to head, from head to hand,
and heart, and love,
63if I could kiss you now
just one place, it would be there,
upon your delicate palm.
64And then upon your neck and inside your setting-sun mouth,
for no, I could never kiss you just one place my love.
I could kiss you never,
but never just once
~wrote Anatiya.
3
If I were your wife I would hide my blush behind a veil of sky. I’d need no embroidered garment, no band of gold. 2And if you should look at my fingers and ask, “My love, with what shall I adorn these hands, these almond blossoms?” 3(for so I imagine your speaking), then I would say, 4“Carve for me your third eye, the one that shows you visions of the Lord, genuine from under your brow, and I shall wear it upon my finger. It is the gem with the most excellent clarity.”
5But fantasy is for the unworthy.
You must know that I am a desert nymph,
whoring with the foliage.
6The trees straighten up
in reverence to me.
7How I myself despise.
It is because of me that they become
brittle and chapped, those blameless sprouts.
8When no cloud offers respite,
and no rain quenches their wooden hearts,
it is because I have laid a curse upon them,
tainted their sap with my own.
9Hard-working ants march up to the spot
to investigate the sweet mingling
of girl-child and resin.
10Dear Father, water your garden!
Do not mind me as I lie among the sticks.
11Jeremiah is the companion of my youth,
and I am only his shadow’s shadow.
12Do not withhold the Heaven’s late showers
on account of such a forgotten dream,
such a forgettable dreamer as me.
13Josiah was eight years old when he became king, nearly twenty years before my birth. 14I imagine him then, as little and lean as I today, nestling himself into that wide golden throne. 15Sweet Josiah, noble and pure, love of your mother, Jedidah daughter of Adaiah descendent of David. She was named for the psalmist’s own son. 16Your father sacrificed unclean animals to chipped idols, pounded his breast in painted temples. 17You were old enough to remember when your father’s own courtiers murdered him and the people of the land did then massacre them. 18With the bloodied hands and thirsty eyes of wolves, they lifted you upon the chair. 19A people awaited your rulership, while you sadly consented to overcome your years. 20A shepherd from a little lamb was forged. O, your eight years must have seemed to you as eight branches of Temple light, filled with oil and set on fire! ~wrote Anatiya.
21You found a companion in Shaphan the scribe. He delivered you a message from on high. 22He proclaimed: “I have found a scroll of the Teaching in the House of the Lord!” 23And Shaphan read to you as Jedidah did when your childhood was still a gift. 24He read, “These are the words that Moses addressed to all Israel on the other side of the Jordan.” 25You did not stir, you barely blinked all the while he read, all through the night by a dim oil lamp. Your heart leapt when he read “O happy Israel!” and a moment later you wept when he read, “He buried him.” 26As he ended the scroll, in that tiny moment, the Lord showed the whole land to you. 27It was cringing and crying to you. You tore your garment, wept and stood. 28You trusted no man at that time, and so you sought the wisdom of a woman, the prophetess Hulda. 29Her husband was the keeper of the wardrobe, and he was knowledgeable
