God promised both they'd have a son,
just as he'd summoned them
to leave the old familiar mountain homestead
and promised them the valley
where milk and honey ran
as water in the rivers.
They never dreamed
how blood would flow in that same valley
as water in the rivers
over centuries, across millenia, generations hence,
generations hence against each other again and again
as often as the moon rose in the sky
In timid disbelief he had to send into the wilderness
his handmaid's son of his own loins, and her with him,
before the ancient crone, his wife,
bore him the son that God had promised them.
God sent the boy up to the sacred mountain
with his father, there to make a sacrifice.
In dire grief the father raised the knife above his son
to faithfully fulfill this cruel demand of God
who staid his hand and offered him a ram
to spare his precious only son by her
his ancient wife.
He never knew how that same God
could not fulfill His own prophesy
promising eternal life
by pushing forth a ram conveniently
to take the place
of His own sacrifice,
His own precious
only
son.