Sensitive Young Jacob
A poem for contrarians to contrarians
For maximal artistic experience, I recommend reading a section and then playing the audio.
I repeat:
For maximal artistic experience, I recommend reading a section and then playing the audio.
Jacob, Jacob, skin is fair,
raised and reared in tents of hair.
Lovely, lovely, was the lair—
A heathen’s home in his elder’s care.
Esau, Esau, rough and rogue,
lived when living still was vogue.
Wore his boots, on Fridays, his brogues.
Though a mute, he entreated in logue.
Jacob, Jacob, white and strong,
Could never see his brother wrong.
But what he gain from source of death,
Harkened the nostrils to God’s warm breath.
His rungs and chains upon earth along.
Give it to Esau: tent, gold, and song.
“To thee I give”, said bereft
of that wisdom foisted upon the deaf.
“Give me soup and one last heft”
“And I’ll go” pointing to the deepest left.
Esau, Esau, wise and quiet,
took the money and did not despise it.
So off did go Jacob in his dream:
a ladder-bridge of sinew and esteem.
Jacob, Jacob, skin so soft,
Came at once to miss haughty loft.
Chalky, Chalky, was the croft—
Bethel’s lime, chinked and scoffed.
Esau, Esau, his brother bore,
His only words came when he’d snore.
“Small luxuries oft’ denied to the poor”
Jacob awake by heat of what he wore.
Jacob, Jacob, loose and nimble,
Danced and pranced alert upon a thimble.
His hosts, angels, in their disheveled time
Yet wrestled a meal of flavors fine.
But the stones bent him, snare and cymbal—
He ran, working hip: no longer a gimbal.
Clasped, “I leave thee lord unfair”
“I grant no amazement and paid no fare”.
Jacob, Jacob could not return back “there”—
“To Haran, to Laban”, another dare.
‘Esau, Esau, his mother’s son,
Probably spent the money on his run.’
Always laughing, always caught in a dream.
Pain, bitter, what Jacob held in esteem.
Jacob, Jacob, sweat like baby’s oil,
Met with fret, Laban after his toil.
Silky, Silky, his girls were his foil—
Mother Rebecca warned of mortal coil.
Leah, Leah, first sister of loin,
Stood out at stranger and asked for coin.
Without inheritance, he could not rejoin—
“Then work if thee wont to adjoin.”
Rachel, Rachel, the second best,
Admonished her sister to give it a rest.
Laban, though, wasn’t for matters moot.
He saw virgin Jacob—a boy to loot.
“Work for me, don’t stay as a guest”
“Learn of the world, it’s spice, it’s zest.”
Though Jacob had shown himself a fool,
Innuendo was deceiver’s weakest tool.
He saw Laban’s face, all its pustules.
“I couldn’t”, as stubborn mule.
Laban, Laban, lascivious goat—
“Take and breed the speckled coat.”
Come back to me, Jacob, in a dream.
Come back to me, with kid and esteem.
Jacob, Jacob, undeterred,
For seven years bred a milky herd.
Bloomy, Bloomy, tasted the curd—
Fine cheese, not even Laban ungird.
Rachel, Rachel, second sister of loin,
Came to love, but stopped at father groin.
The eldest was to be first to conjoin—
“Sister, I submit to thee to subjoin.”
Leah, Leah, was a lesbian.
She despised her father—wasted no man.
She wanted money to move away,
But poor Jacob, caught, was to stay.
Laban, in age, would bargain and ban—
To award thee as dowry—a dark plan.
Though Leah had known the truth,
To her right sister she gave no proof.
Rachel was innocent—a maiden goof.
“We cannot love; Our father art sleuth.”
Rachel, Rachel, father’s dope—
Leah would save—she would elope.
In the night within Jacob’s dream
She took upon to abandon all esteem.
Jacob, Jacob, palely wed,
Found pregnant Leah beside his bed.
Chaste soul, of purest head—
Yet the body had gone as it was led.
Laban, Laban, his face tore,
For seven years wages, he swore.
Jacob, skin chafing—wait seven more?
Rachel, cried tears through every pore.
Esau, Esau, what have I wrought?
Why didn’t you warn of idyllic thought?
His hip burned of loin-some wretch—
Jacob had become under—a letch!
Each son of Laban, each festered rot.
I will leave for shechem, stop me not!
“Give me the white-coated for a herd”
“Marry Leah”, “my embarrassment deterred”
“Then I will go and say no further word”
“Follow, sister, in what wrought whirred”.
Rachel, Rachel, alost with teraphim,
Followed for Jacob, her beloved cherubim.
The muddy hooves’ path lost her dream—
Forever chasing, newfound wanderer’s esteem.
Jacob, Jacob, adrift to beckon,
Came of herd upon the city, shechem.
Seven kids, Caprine years, settled glen—
Leah, see, a sun, free to condemn.
Shechem of Shechem, tasted of fruit,
A Sheriff of Sheriffs over all things cute.
Dinah of the glen was his pursuit—
He garnered mohar for grand repute.
Leah, Leah, vindictive mother,
Discerned through his fat smother.
Coin and anointings weighed his heart—
Attached and Listening, sent to upstart.
Distraught to stop loss from dother,
She begged Jacob to send for brother.
“To thee I give”, said bereft,
“A lack of wisdom of daughter’s best”.
I cannot send for my brother lest
there rages inheritance wrest.
Jacob, Jacob, hear, O injury—
Thy name, Israel, lucky by late victory.
For brothers, the curse of slain dream
In denial of neighbor’s dwelling esteem.
Israel, Israel, tents of moonlight—
Came a longing for brotherhood’s sight.
Esau, the nations’ dual, lost at sleight.
The Martian’s voice at history’s blight.
Jacob, Jacob, sensitive young man,
Lived as he had lived: without a plan.
He had done what he could and can—
Yet resentment took out from span.
Esau, Esau, with four hundred men,
Had heard of the victory by the glen.
The brother unloved in all places,
The brother beloved by all races.
Hallelujah, my soul—awake from den,
To the cardinal beyond. Amen.
The golden silence of a brother bore
Fruit of soup beneath sleeping snore.
Edom, the planet red for longing more,
Looked down from the hilltop of yore.
Jacob, Esau, brothers rich in sight,
returned forever through their fright
to resolve contradictions of that dream:
A thousand nations of one esteem.