Saturday – Passover
I asked my poet friend Norman Finkelstein for a good Passover poem and he alerted me to this one by Harvey Shapiro, found in Mountain, Fire, Thornbush (Swallow, 1961).
The Passover seder, of course, revolves around remembering, and Shapiro’s poem points out that remembering was already part of the initial Exodus events. According to Genesis, Joseph, who initially brought the Hebrews to Egypt, told them God would remember them if they carried his bone with him were they ever to leave Egypt (Genesis: 50:21). Therefore, “when they escaped/They carried a pack of bones/In a mummy-coffin like an ark.”
Shapiro draws a contrast between the past and what is to come. The “clouds by day and fire by night” are like “dreams/Or something painted on the sky.” In other words, they envision future miracles, and the Hebrews will experience the parting of the Red Sea, the Ten Commandments, their own kingdom, and Solomon’s Temple. The bones, on the other hand, is the foundation upon all else rests. That’s why they carried “history like an ark.”
God was in the bones.
Exodus When they escaped They carried a pack of bones In a mummy-coffin like an ark. Of course they had the pillar Of clouds by day and fire by night, But those were like dreams Or something painted on the sky. God was in the bones Because Joseph had said God will remember you If you take me hence This was before the miracle By the sea or the thundering mountain, Before the time of thrones And cherubim. They were Only now drawn forth To eat the history feast And begin the journey. Why then should they carry history Like an ark, and the remembering Already begun?