please, won’t you look at me, father?
i can’t erase the memory
of the surrender in your eyes
if i keep staring at your back.
you held my hand as we climbed the mountain.
i felt your pulse through my palm,
your grip tight against the sweat.
God has called us, you said with urgency,
yet you took your time as we ascended.
i can’t remember what i feared more:
the blade,
the flame,
or the aftermath.
who would have made the bigger sacrifice
if there was no ram in the thicket— you? me?
or mother?
is there no test of faith more agonizing
than to forgive?
but even in my final breath, i would have.
i love you even though
i may never understand it,
if only you would tell me. i don’t ask for much—
father! please.
soothe my shivering.
i’m afraid
the next time
i see a knife
i might think
it’s
love.
— Jade A.
escapril day 3: eye contact
@adventurerswritingguild day 3: hand / god / knife
Have you done any Isaac and Rebecca ficlets in the past?
Isaac spends an hour in the marketplace, scouring the jeweler's stands for the perfect dowry gift. In the end he settles on a golden sunburst nose ring and beaten bangles as silver as the moon. He will give his wife the heavens, he decides, to wear as her adornments.
He can barely sleep those long weeks his father's servant is away, scouring the land of his ancestors for the right bride. He takes to wandering the fields in the blue-light just before dawn, kicking up rocks and conversing with the Lord. He is 37, well past the age of sweaty palms and ruddy blushes, but still he is nervous.
What if the girl doesn't want to come live in with him? What bitterness and enmity is sown between them? What if the marriage bed is frigid?
He imagines what she may be like, dark or fair, curvaceous of slim, somber or smiling.
He decides, he tells the Lord, that he will be grateful with a kind spirit and a pair of lovely eyes.
When the caravan finally reappears on the horizon one blazing hot summer day, it's nearly doubled in size. The new bride has brought her nurse with her, and household servants, and all her worldly possessions.
Isaac drops the scythe from his hand as the caravan comes to a stop next to the field where he labors. A woman dismounts her camel and strides across the parched earth to meet him. He can make out the glint of his bracelets on her wrist, the glimpse of a lovely brown ankle under her skirts, but her face and hair is veiled.
She stops directly in front of him, holding her chin high. Her khol-lined eyes are dark and lovely as a night without stars.
Will you not let me look at you? He asks.
You procured me for your wife sight unseen, she shoots back, raising a thick eyebrow. Perhaps I shall hide my face from you until the wedding night.
A smile tugs at his lips.
She's testing him. His mother would be proud.
Isaac takes her hand, rubbing a little circle into her palm with his thumb. She softens under his touch, her muscles giving way. She does not expect his gentleness, he realizes.
Then we will learn to love each other by touch and smell and sound, he says. Although I should hope someday to earn the privilege of gazing upon you.
She pauses for a moment, then reaches us and pulls the veil from her head. Black waves tumble over her shoulders, framing a ruggedly beautiful face with a full mouth, square jaw, and strong nose.
I am no great beauty, she teases. Perhaps you'd like to send me back and order another bride?
You are the very promise of God made flesh, he says, then cups her face and kisses her.
Despite the explicit instruction not to, Orpheus looks back. He needs to know if Eurydice will follow him anywhere, and so, he turns- And he finds her standing in place, unmoving.
We, the audience, find this sad for a few reasons:
1. We know there was a time when Eurydice would have followed him to the ends of the earth and straight into hell- but now, she watches Orpheus ascend to heaven alone. We know there was a time when she would have followed. We know what has changed between the then and the now.
2. Orpheus does not know what has changed. Orpheus does not know Eurydice stays because of how badly she loves. Orpheus thinks Eurydice has stayed behind because she does not love him enough.
3. Eurydice thinks the same thing. We know this, but we cannot tell them. They have both gone to places we cannot go.
4. By looking back, Orpheus has doomed them both, thinking he was saving them. If given the chance, he would do it again.
5. At some point, Orpheus believed the world was good, and Eurydice believed the world was evil. At some point, their love was powerful enough to change each other's minds.
6. Now, both see what the world could be. Orpheus reveres it. Eurydice fears it. Both are wrong. We don't know if their love can become powerful enough to change their minds again.
7. Eurydice does not follow, but she waits to see if Orpheus will turn around again. She cannot resist one last look.
8. We, the audience, know what has happened, and we know why- Orpheus and Eurydice are not gods. Their mistakes are human. We watch the scene again and again, denying what has transpired, longing for a deeper reason- coffees, lies, a higher power- but the story of Orpheus and Eurydice plays out the way it always does, for the reason it always has- love.
9. These two know the story of Orpheus and Eurydice well. Perhaps they watched it play out. Perhaps they greeted Eurydice at death's door. Perhaps they sat in a tavern and heard Orpheus play. Aziraphale thinks the story is about the inevitably of fate, the inability to resist the higher-ups- a god's will is ineffable. Crowley thinks the story is about the inevitably of leaving, the inability to have a happy ending- a god is always cruel. Neither have gotten this story quite right.
10. Once again, Aziraphale and Crowley have forgotten to focus on the love.
I think that life's greatest poets and storytellers have been people who drank the cup of suffering, died to the poison and rose up the third time to reach out to God.