GHAZAL:

Abstract

There are different meanings to the word, passage. When God passed over the houses of the Israelites it was a time when God could be imagined as moving in this world. When Moses was told to speak to the rock he hit it instead. Though God had given him other chores which he performed, like pulling the stiff-necked people across the desert, or begging God to forgive their molten hungers and complacency, still He knew in His heart that no matter what ensued He remained the God who would not allow His beloved’s passage into the place he sought. Lips dry and body reaching, still his God remained stubborn and equally stiff. No. That’s it. One chance. You will not go there. But listen, as the wind begins his God is saying something else about the word, passage. A man can hear in his sentence a death knell, the very thing he wants denied, a God’s iron clad refusal. Or he can hear in the language of the gods coming up from the deep another sound that evokes his own, his God’s understanding that the real journey goes on inside where the voice is found. His tongue his weary arms his silences that want no God to come again with promises begin their movement towards another source. If he can find in himself the gift of God to speak to the ones receiving the gift he seeks, then Stern can take this passage outward and speak to her estranged friend, or God.