Exiled

I was there --
where silver moonlight lay
like whispered melodies,
like layered ice
upon the branches of the rivered gardens’s trees
and sleepy lions sprawled
with oxen and with lambs
beneath their leaves,
where winds and skies were always fair,
and angels with their glowing swords
plow-shared
stood guard against no enemy.
Yes, there I was,
divinely sanctuaried in
(all innocence and ecstasy with Eve)
a place unique unto itself
and not like any other
anywhere.

But now I am a foreigner,
displaced, exiled,
standing on unfallow earth
on sod that, cursed, rebels
against my touch,
where wives are natal breached with pain,
and my son’s blood
is vengeance voiced
and crying constantly to God.