Tablet

“Moses Breaks the Tablets of the Law” by Gustav Dore

Today is Pentecost Sunday, when Christians remember the giving of the Holy Spirit. “Pentecost” means “Fifty,” and occurs 50 days after Jesus rose from the dead. On Pentecost, the fullness of the Spirit was poured out on Jesus to signify His anointing as King of kings. From Him, the Spirit trickled down to the church, just like oil poured on someone’s head would run down onto their body (Psalm 133).

Pentecost is also the season when God gave His law to Israel, generations before Jesus. Moses met God on Mount Sinai, and God gave him the law on tablets of stone “inscribed by the finger of God” as Exodus says.

“Tablet” is a poem that tells the story of God giving Moses the law from the perspective of the tablet of stone. This poem will be in my next book, A Song of Glass: Dreams, Stories, and Poems.

Tablet

Clouds furrowed above the mountain I was hewn from
then funneled into a finger whose tip spun and sparked 
as it chiseled words into me.

I watched the funnel recede above his head
as he picked me up, his smile growing in the glow 
of the letters until they cooled and went dark.

Their light wasn’t out long
when he seemed distracted,
head cocked as if listening.

I heard nothing, but without warning
his knees hit the ground; he clutched me 
in the fist of his body, shaking and gasping.

At length, he was still, and his grip slackened.
He stood and, because of my weight,
boulder-stumbled down the mountain.

Calls, cackling, and whooping
flocked around us as we reached 
the base of the mountain.

His adamant eyes and contorted mouth 
flashed and vanished, flashed and vanished,
as firelight lashed the shadows.

Groaning, he wrestled me
over his head into a sky 
hemorrhaging dusk.

In his hands, my view teetered
between his wavy locks of hair
snake-striking the breeze 

and a world inverted
where a color wheel of dancers whirled 
in worship around a beast 

forged from gold; 
a likeness of gilt 
hanging in a haze of glitter.

He gave a cry; suddenly weightless, 
I tumbled through billows of rushing air
until the knuckled earth struck

and sent a lightning storm of fissures
streaking through me.  Bits of granite
whizzed into the crowd of dancers

and nicked his legs as his lungs 
heaved the stone dust of my ghost,
drifting from where I lay broken.