{ Sherre Vernon: Elijah Dreaming. }

[delga]

Elijah Dreaming
by Sherre Vernon

1 Kings 18-19
Iraq, 2004

Brother,

I dreamed again of famine
in Baghdad, through the earth,
a tongue, a child crying Elijah
is come to kill me.

We summoned four hundred
brought them down
slit their throats
and made a trench.
I am the only
surviving.

I have seen the noon bare
her breasts for a little attention:
a green olive shawl
over the branches of white
blossoms. Like shade,
she says even the cactus
gives milk.

“Why are you here, Elijah?”

In Syria, in Baghdad:
the white broom juniper –

Through the Mojave and Sierra:
your joshua –

I am afraid.

It’s a day’s journey
into the dunes
to summon the grave:
I am no better than my fathers.

Our grandfather, an old man
fills a small canvas bag
with blossoms, the brush
too tall for his reach.
He makes me take it.
Grandmother says he does this
because he is dying.
I can feel her
bones inside me.

The sky grains brittle
with wind, and a heavy yashmak rain
the wind, a quaking,
a fire, a tiny whispering sound –

And I thought of the Anasazi
And I thought of Israel,
stacking stone upon stone,
so I hid my face and stood
at the entrance of the cave,
took the old road back.
Oh, my brother,
let the desert throw her cloak
over you.

--

Many things happened today.