Shemot, שְׁמוֹת "Names" Exodus. 1:1 - 6:1

Moses and Elijah

Poetic notes on Shemot*

The arrow of time

is the arrow of redemption

Not one moment passes

without being fractured and repaired

through the power of the coming redemption

Not one moment passes

that does not arise from the Mercy Seat

above the Ark of the Covenant of God

It was mercy that held a sword to Moshe's throat

Some have said,

(indeed, the flaming sword

and the spiritual famine said:)

“What God desires most

is that we believe in Him

and keep His commandments”

God’s own whisper said,

(indeed, the approaching redemption

of Israel said:)

“What God desires most

is to show us His love for us,

and that, knowing His love,

we might believe in Him

and keep His commandments”

In order to be ourselves

we must receive the instruction

of God our Father, in order to do it

Only then will we not do

what the king of Egypt says

Only then will we not kill Jerusalem's boys

All Israel will be the handmaid of God

laying down her life to lift up the life of Moses

The highest hight is reached only from the grave

Elijah the prophet,

who reveals the perfect way,

will sit with those at the broken table

There on that broken table

he will light the candle that turns the night

to meet the day

Whose soul is the candle that Elijah will light?

It is the man, the child, who holds HaShem's hand

It is the stranger in the strange land

It is Moses the stranger who said,

“Let my people go!”

God's firstborn went out

and ascended to the holy gates of light above

from the dark prison land of Osiris below

But the gates of light to them were blinding!

Their eyes had been enslaved

in fifty levels of darkness

How should those long blind walk in light?

They faced the fifty blinding gates

How should they enter in?

The guide of the blind viewed the land from afar,

though the gate key was in his hand

It was the Torah key that eluded Adam

“Holy, Holy, Holy,” the fiery voices sang!

The key holders shrank back,

but never turned away and ran

Moses like Jacob would die outside the land,

pleading with God always

to allow him to lead Israel into the resurrection land

He had refused from the beginning

to lead them only from exile to exile

but Moses also, like all of Levi

heard Jacob say,

The sceptre shall not depart from Judah,

nor the children of the Torah from his feet

until Mashiach will come;

all the children will gather to him

The nation will stand eye to eye in Jerusalem with him

For Elijah will mend the broken table,

and he will nurse the weeping eye,

when the child has mastered the lesson

G-d will remove the shadow of fear from the eye

Abraham will embrace Moshe in Hebron

They will play with their grandchildren in Jerusalem

For the redemption of Adam will come

from Mashiach’s land