Collected Poems
Page 9
‘Grin, then,’ cried Miriam. ‘Grin in your slavery.
But he – ’ And she ran to her mother, putting her head
To her mother’s belly to hear the heartbeat within.
‘He would not grin, he – ’ A woman nodded and said:
‘So that’s the way of it. I wondered.’ And Jochebed:
‘I thought he would be born in Tabris, in the pastures.
We would have been there in three fullnesses of the moon,
At the forest of Nisim.’ – ‘He, you said. You seem sure.’
And the blind old man: ‘All babies are called
He before they’re born. And some of them
Afterwards too.’ He did not understand the laughter,
Turning his open mouth, like an eye, to the laughter.
Laughter in a place of slaves but in the place of
Royal divinity no laughter. Aromatic oil-lamps,
Shadows, effigies, a cross-legged scribe
Reading to the Pharaoh, Pharaoh cutting in to say:
‘The sons of the men of the sand. The name diminishes them.
But they are not diminished.’ Dutiful smiles
From the assembled councillors. ‘Continue reading.’
‘Majesty. They came from the land of Canaan,
Driven by famine and plague. In Egypt sought they
Grain and pasture, and behold they found them both.
Their sons and their sons’ sons grow fat and
Multiply in the houses of the lord of the house of
Life, the house of death. They multiply and are become
An immense multitude. In order that they may not,
In the event of war, unite with our enemies …’
The sentence unfinished, the stylus poised. Pharaoh:
‘So it is written, so shall our
Posterity read it. But the sentence is unfinished,
The stylus poised. Let me hear,’ and he looked at them, ‘wisdom.’
There was a pause. The head councillor said:
‘This present mode of oppression is clearly
Inefficacious. As I see it, the tribes of Israel,
Mingled together in slavery as they now are,
Lose each its special code of law and restraint.
Constrained from above, they are grown loose beneath.
Lechery, adultery, incest. They grow loose.
They grow. This zest for breeding – it is the mark of
An animal race. They couple like dogs of the desert.’
But the Pharaoh said, and they had to strain to hear him:
‘And we – we glory in stability, changelessness, power.
Along comes the god of death and says: Behold,
I am all these things. The sentence stands unfinished.
Let the sentence now be pronounced.’ The poised stylus
Dove to the tablet. ‘Every son that is born
Shall be cast into the river. But every daughter
Shall be saved alive.’ The scribe looked up at that.
So it was rods and whips and the occasional
Salutary thrust of the spear that held them back,
The wailing and cursing, as the farm-carts filled
With wailing babies. It became a game,
On Nile bank, to see who could throw the furthest,
Bets laid, but some of the soldiers were sick,
And not only on a won bet of a jar of palm-wine.
They’re things, man, no more, go on, throw. They threw.
It was a long business. General commanding commanded
A free day and an extra beer ration. They threw,
Some of them, in their sleep. And then calm,
Nile unperturbed, birdsong, a gorgeous day
As the princess came down to the river, a cortège
Of priests intoning:
Lord of the river and of the quickening mud
Whence all manner of lowly things are brought to birth,
Bring to thy servant the gift of fecundity,
That she may not be despised among the daughters of earth,
And the worth of her birth be matched by the worth of thy gift.
Lift her, O river lord, to the ranks of the mothers.
The ritual disrobing: the golden headpiece lifted
To disclose a painful baldness, then the silks
Whistling away from scars, emaciation
On slenderness otherwise comely, framed in
Palms and stonework, royalty unimpaired
By the absurd daubing of Nile mud, the carven
Beauty of the face unmoved, unmoved still
As the filthy rite proceeded, ended, the silks
Were laid to the ulcered flesh, the golden headpiece
Restored, and, to a wordless chant with the rising
Notes of hope in it, the cortège left the river.
The river flowed clear, save for lotus and riverweed,
But then the first of the infant corpses appeared,
Floating downstream.
There had been no craft,
Or perhaps cruelty had its limit, to snatch out the foetus
And examine its sex. So Jochebed came to her time,
Groaning in their corner of a hovel of heavy sleep,
And Amram kneeling anxious by her, each cry of her pain
Forcing him to stifle it with his hand:
‘Forgive me, my love. Forgive me. Someone may hear.
I trust no one.’ And some of the sleepers stirred,
Dreaming perhaps of a dead son, then resettled.
One of the sleepers awoke and came softly to him,
And he started, but it was his daughter Miriam.
‘There is a sort of shed a little way off,
Full of mattocks and brick-moulds. It must be there.’
He nodded. It was a heavy task, under the moon, dogs baying.
The deformed door creaked. ‘A space under that cart.’
Her agony mounted, Miriam looked wide-eyed, and then
He came out on the flood, crying to the world. As in response
The feet of a patrol could be heard on cobbles
Not too far off, soldiers marching in moonlight
And that cry going out, moonlight flooding his sex.
Sing, Miriam prayed and, as in response,
The soldiers sang, and the dirty song was a blessing:
Here’s the way
We earn our pay
Who’s the enemy we slay?
Baby Israelites if they
Have balls between their legs
That’s no way
To earn your pay
We would rather any day
Take their mothers and then lay
Our balls between their legs
Amram in wonder held the howling child in his arms,
In agony and joy for a second son. And yet, how, how –
‘None comes here,’ Miriam said. ‘I know. And if any comes,
I shall be in the way of his coming. It must be three
Roundings of the moon. I shall sit here and guard
And I shall weave.’ Weave? She wove out of bulrushes
And parried queries in the sun. But where did she go?
To the house of a cousin, just north of Pithom.
And when will she return? She still has fever.
She sends greeting but begs that none come near her.
The fever is catching. What is that thing you weave?
A basket. A cage. A cage for doves. A cage indeed.
A cage within a cage. When the cage was finished,
Miriam took it, eager-eyed, to her mother
And the three-month child, milk bubbling on his lip,
And said: ‘Listen.’ And Jochebed listened in wonder.
But it was in fear, in working daylight, that Miriam
Carried her cradle or ark to the Nile, opening it
Often and often as she sped through the meadows
To c
luck at the child, to whisper ‘Can you breathe’?
The river’s weedy length no longer carried
Human corpses. Rats swam, a fish smote the surface and snapped.
And then a cage of bones, a child’s bones. She wept,
Heard an ass bray, started, then was able to smile,
Then to laugh. ‘Be brave’, she whispered. ‘You have much to do.’
The baby cried and she hushed him. Then a voice asked:
‘What have you in there?’ A man’s voice. From her crouch
She saw strong legs, hair, leather, a countryman
With a bag and leather bottle, the face stupid
But not unkind. ‘My things’, she said. ‘My treasure.’
He laughed, and the ass brayed, and the laughter of ladies
Could now be heard, downstream. ‘Treasure,’ he brayed,
Moving off, then whistled a dog. She, from the reeds,
Watched covertly. Downstream, ladies playing at ball.
And then a deep drum from within the
Palace gardens, it must be, and a male chant
As of some holy procession coming. The ladies quietened,
Made moues at each other, then scattered through green.
Then Miriam saw a lady immensely tall,
A gold headpiece, silks liquid in the sun,
Well-attended, languid priestesses, they must be,
And burly priests, coming slowly to the river, intoning:
You who nourish the reed and tamarind,
The date-palm and the pepper-tree,
From whose mud the crocodile breeds,
Many-toothed, tough as a chariot…
And it was at that moment that Miriam saw a child’s corpse,
Ravaged by rats, float drunkenly downstream. It was the
Moment of courage, to answer the dead with the living,
And delicately consigned the bulrush cage or cradle
To the waters. The princess, she must be, said, seeing
In revulsion that bloated and bitten cadaver,
‘You address the river as a river of life. Leave me.’
They waited, unsure. ‘Leave me, leave me.’ And they left,
Save for her, it must be, waiting-woman, maid.
‘Live,’ whispered Miriam, ‘live.’ A current took the
Cage, cradle, ark, and swirled it shoreward,
Into the reeds. The lady saw. The ladies saw. The
Princess, it must be, said: ‘That. What is it? Go in and
Bring it to me. Quick, before the river
Takes it again.’ And it was so. To what or whom,
Miriam wondered, did one pray now? She prayed to the
Infant now passing from arms to arms, yelling hard
Against the melting wall of surprise: Let them that would kill
Preserve and nourish. More. The royal river
Gives you to a royal house. A prince in Egypt.
Joseph was a prince in Egypt. They were lost in green,
The child’s crying, the ladies’ cooing. Miriam’s task
Was not yet done. She left the river. In the royal garden
A twitter of ladies (who is he where is he from wellfed
Look at those ringlets of fat why is he here who is his
Mother the Nile is his father anyway) about the arms of the
Princess, hushing him, saying to him not to cry, singing:
Out of the desert the wind blows strong
But cool but cool from out of the sea
The desert burns and the day is long…
‘He is hungry.’ She stopped, they turned to the source of the voice,
Miriam standing boldly at the fringe of the garden,
An empty vase in her hands (a servant to get flowers,
No questions asked). ‘He is good. He only cries
When he is hungry.’ And then the flurry of who are you
Who let you in here call the guards. But the princess:
‘Wait.’ They desisted. ‘Come here, girl.’ She came,
Uneasy but without deference. ‘You know this little child?’
Miriam: ‘I am an Israelite. We know no
Men children. The Egyptians kill them at birth.’
‘How do you know this child is a boy?’ No answer.
‘Do you know his mother?’ And Miriam said boldly:
‘I know many mothers who weep for their sons. Whose
Breasts are heavy with milk.’ And the princess:
‘You mean you can find me a nurse among the Israelites?’
‘Yes. One who weeps and whose
Breasts are heavy with milk.’ The princess was eager:
‘Bring her. For my son. For he is my son.
And his father is the Nile. His name shall be
Moses. Meaning my son.’ But Miriam, full of light, said:
‘Meaning, in our tongue: I have brought him forth.’
And she sped back to Pithom for Jochebed. A royal summons.
The eyes of the other women narrowed. Why? What?
What is this about? Saying more, seeing
Daughter and mother leave and the mother, fevered so long,
So heavy-breasted. But the princess said
(And Jochebed had no eyes for the garden, only the marble,
Effigies, effigies, only for the one she suckled):
‘What is your name?’
‘Does your breast hurt you?’
‘I am sorry that your little boy
Died.’ But Miriam, bold, said: ‘Was killed.’
And the princess: ‘We – mothers cannot easily understand
High state policy. We are the givers of life,
Daughters of the sun. Men turn their backs on the sun
To build labyrinths out of the light. The labyrinths
Breed strange monsters. These become the
Gods of darkness. Men love their dark gods.’
The ladies look at her strangely. Heresy? The leavings of
Some ancient faith, destroyed because inconvenient,
Hence heresy? But the princess said to Jochebed:
‘You will come back. In four hours time.
And you will keep coming back until he has
No further need of you. When he has done with your breast,
He shall be wholly mine. You will forget him.
Entirely. Completely. For ever. My son.
You will be paid, of course. One of you, pay her.’
A coin in her unwilling hand, a coin in
Amram’s hand, a gold coin in Pithom. And the women said:
‘She sold her child to the Egyptians. To save him.
Why should her child be saved and none of ours?
Cunning. What is so special about her son that he
He should be saved? She sold her child for
Money. Whores sell their children,
Whores.’ A man said whore at Jochebed,
And she said nothing. Another spat in her path.
Amram said nothing. And then he said, to Jochebed:
‘What name have they given him?’ She shrugged, saying:
‘Moses.’ Moses. Amram tasted the name,
Not liking it much. It was not the name
That he would have given the boy. Miriam said, full of light:
‘Meaning, in our tongue, I have brought him forth.’
They looked at her strangely, a strange girl, full of
Strange imaginings, not like other girls. Moses, then.
Mouths round on the name, they went in to supper.
Corn mash, garlic, dates, beer. A gold coin
Useless in Pithom. I have brought him forth.
2
THE YOUNG MOSES
And she whom he called mother came to die.
During dalliance in a royal garden, close to sunset,
He thought he heard, raising his lips from the
Offered lips to listen. The girl teased:
‘You hear bats. You hear fi
eldmice. You hear locusts.
But you always hear them at the wrong time – ’
‘I thought,’ he said, ‘I heard,’ frowning, ‘my mother – ’
‘My mother,’ in mockery gentle enough, and she tried to
Pull his mouth down to hers, he resisted, she pouted.
He rose and ran, she running after, laughing,
Through green mazes, reaching cool stone, effigies,
Effigies, the palace of the princess. The princess
Lay in cool gloom, a jewel, muted by the gloom,
In a bone cage that had been hands, her voice muted,
Saying: ‘Give this to her, send her away, you will have
Many jewels, many girls to give them to. But to-
Night there is one girl who must say, must say:
Where is my lord? I am taken from him. She is
Lingering outside. I can smell desire and life.
Take it to her.’ So he took it to where she waited,
Plump among the effigies, and she snatched it, saying:
‘What is it worth?’ And he: ‘If it were worth all the
Gold of the king’s,’ smiling, ‘goldmines – ’
‘I know, I know, it could not be so precious
As our night together. Which we shall not have.’
Pouting, then smiling, fingering her jewel.
‘I shall be hungry tonight for your hands.’ Thinking already
Of other hands, but then only of his hands,
For there were no hands like his in all Egypt.
He left her, taking those hands to the mother’s body,
Hands of a healer, saying as he kneaded kneaded
Gently: ‘The body. Is a mystery. Like the heavens.
If we could turn for a moment. The skin.
The flesh. To glass. Then we could see the.
Wonders of the streets. Of the city within.
The streets are sometimes roaring. With evil invaders.
Then we talk. Of a sickness. Here are two roads.
That lead to the. Citadel of your lungs. If I could
Clear those. Infested ways. You would be
Well again.’ And she said, lulled: ‘They tell me
That you love wisdom, but not all the time. Your senses
Get in the way of thought. You hear bats and fieldmice
Crying. They say that you become impatient.’
And Moses, rapt in the office his hand performed:
‘Impatient. Sometimes. They say that the
Wisdom of Egypt is. Complete and sealed. That there is
No new wisdom. To be learned. The death of a
Man. Means more than the. Birth of a. Child.
For what new wisdom. Can the. Child bring to the