Maryam – Child Of Mothers

                        Bracken slopes;
                        scrub-arid wildflow’r –
                        the Arbel mountain’s side.
                        She steps, her basin-cleaned feet
                        falt’ring; firm.
      Maryam of Magdala stood stark above the landscape, the town she’d left weeks (months.?.) before o’erflooded by the tide of dawn. Her body in the wash of sunfire felt its heat re-lace the air with energy, the cold still holding to her skin like a shroud of mourning.
                        Naked.
                        Agnostic.
                        Alone.
      She had known herself before; had come to nearly know herself without her mother. She did not know herself any longer.
      Nine years as a trinity of th’feminine ‘cross generations bonded; five years as a child ‘n her grandmother, their motherdaughter torn from time. Now f’months (or weeks.?.) she’d been the only Way-Truth-Light remaining, left without direction, cold, ‘n dark-bound in a sea of doubt.
      Amidst Amongst About the rocky space beneath her feet – the rushing tricklestream of mountain water. Running clear, it crashcaresses cold upon her heels ‘n ankles, carrying beyond her feet the lining of the earth.
      The world turned further t’ward the fire that was life; was death.
      Maryam dressed her body in the simple clothing of the mountain folk. The Elder who had heard her story helped her settle, rest, ‘n eat ‘n drink. He’d given her these clothes; he gave her seven lay’rs to travel – a journey through her childhood’s grief before her Woman dawned.

“Who was your father?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you know anything of him?”
“No.”
“Did your mother ever mention him?”
“I don’t think so… I don’t remember her ever mentioning him.”
“Nor your grandmother?”
“No.”
“Did you know your grandfather?”
“No, but my mother did talk about him.”
“Her father?”
“Yes.”
“Did you ever ask about him?”
“My grandfather?”
“Your father.”
“I… must have…”
“You don’t remember?”
“I don’t recall ever asking. But I must have. At some point…”
“Perhaps you learned early on not to?”
“Maybe…”
“So, you don’t know your father, nor anything about him. Your mother and her mother came to Nunnaya from… where?”
“They took the Way Of Horus.”
“That is a long road… And it is not usually referred to by that name.”
“That’s what we called it.”
“Where along that road did your mother and grandmother begin? How far did they come before reaching ha-Galil?”
“My grandmother told me stories… Before me, they met a family in Mizrayim. I was named after the mother. She and the father had a son.”
“The mother was called Maryam?”
“Yes.”
“Do you remember the names of the man and boy?”
“No… I only remember the mother’s because my mother gave me her name.”
“And this family were Mizrayi?”
“No, they were like us. Are? They must still be. Somewhere…”
“You have never met them?”
“No, they left to come back north along the Way Of – what is the road called?”
“We say it is the Way Of The Sea.”
“Way Of The Sea…”
“But you do not have to change what you call it! I simply found it to be an intriguing clue.”
“Clue? To what?”
“To you. To your origins.”
“Do you think my origins are Mizrayim?”
“Maybe! But you were born here. And you have lived only here. So perhaps it is only a very small piece of you.”
“But a big piece of my mother and grandmother?”
“Perhaps.”
“And my father…”
“And perhaps your father.”
“Should I go there?”
“Do you want to go there?”
“I’ve only ever been here…”
“There is much beyond Magdala Nunnaya. Being here, on this mountain with us, is a start.”
“But I can still see my home.”
“You wish you couldn’t?”
“Maybe… Yes.”
“Then you will need to go farther.”
“To Mizrayim…”
“A much more drastic step then climbing Arbel! But perhaps not more difficult than your first small steps away from home?”
“You’ve already helped me so much…”
“And we will help you still further! I will start making arrangements, plans.”
“Thank you!”
“In the meantime, stay. Continue as you have been. You have learned your duties so well and so quickly! You are a new yet valued part of our community.”

                        A branch bearing fruit –
                        fig-ripe.
                        The town tree guards against the sun.
      Maryam, shade-hidden, watches as the people, these Nasrani, move about performing life on earth-borne feet.
                        Nazrath…
                        The sounds of
                        carpentry ‘n ritual.
      Jewish roots deep-running, ranging strong ‘neath Roman rule – a land laced through with story ‘n millennia.
      The girl who would be woman, orphan daughter of Magdala, had accompanied a group who came to Nazrath, passing Arbel. They came south from Darmasqa, seeking Efa at the coast – from th’Well-Watered Land to the Mound Of The Sycamore Fig. And as she sat ‘n waited for the group to reassemble at this spot, she noticed that a Nasrani was watching her.
                        Is she Hathor?
                        Is she Isis?
                        This is a mother…
      “Are you lost?”
      She looked to Maryam to be the age that her mother was at death.
      “No – I’m waiting.”
      The woman stepped into the shade of the tree ‘n pulled aside her headscarf.
      “For what?”
      Her eyes were a Yes to the possibilities of palms-outstretching love; her stance was the bearing of a sun ‘bout which the gravity of healing spread. She took her feet from her sandals, standing soleward to the risen earth, making with her face a look that said she knew this child.
      “For the ones I‘m travelling with.”
      “I feel that I know you…”
      “I’ve never been here before.”
      “Your face… I’ve seen it. I know it.”
      “Have you been to Magdala?”
      “No – though it is so close.”
      “I’ve only ever been there.”
      “But you are on a journey now! Where are you travelling to?”
      “Mizrayim.”
      The woman’s eyes – they blazed like Ra-Horakhty.
      “Mizrayim? Why are you going there?”
      “To find… something, I think.”
      “My son is there now – though I don’t know where exactly.”
      “How old is your son?”
      “He is twenty-two. Twenty-one… One of these!”
      “What is his”
      “Maryam!”
      Both the woman ‘n the girl who was nearly woman turned upon the calling of the name. Another Nasrani beckoned to the woman who was standing in the fig-tree shade. She re-sandalled her feet; threw her headscarf back upon her tangled hair. Before she walked away, she ‘n the one who sat tried to see each other.
      Eyes seeking mind’s eye contact…
      I know you.

                        By water raised,
                        but this?
                        Unfathomable…
                        The sea,
                        unto the ending of the world.
      She looked out across the universe.
      From the shore by her home you could always see the land beyond the lake’s expanse. But here the sea was the sky ‘n the sky the sea.
      Maryam marvelled at Efa; Tel Shikmona – an immense ‘n immeasurably busy port thriving on the slopes of Karmel.
                        Peak off’rings
                        at the burning place.
                        Cave-angel; prophet.
      “Magdala.”
      “Hmm?”
      “Come on.”
      “Everything ready?”
      “Everything’s ready.”
      “Have you seen this?”
      “Seen what?”
      “The sea.”
      “I have seen the sea. This sea. Many times.”
      “After all those many times, does it ever get any less…”
      “No. Never.”
      “It is like… like…”
      “It is like nothing.”
      “Yeah – like nothing.”
      “Are you ready for this?”
      “I am. No… But I am going.”
      “You have travelled far from your home already.”
      “Not far enough.”
      “Mizrayim is far enough?”
      “I don’t know. I think so.”
      “Based on what?”
      “I don’t know. I think I was conceived there.”

                        In caravan
                        along the Way Of Horus –
                        days of travel.
                        Roman rule
                        o’er ancient land.
      “Is this land holy?”
      “All land is holy.”
      “Is it mine?”

                        Southward;
                        now west.
                        Mizrayim…
      The falcon in the form of a lion – spectral-sparse are the ruins of the fortress.
      The edges of the kingdom…
      Three-thousand years of painted words on stone, their magic stored. Now they blaze in a losing battle ‘gainst the coming silence…
      Oblivion.
      What is story carved in stone that can’t be read?
      What is ink on paper when its soul can’t be deciphered?
      Her mother stepped out of Egypt.
      Now she enters.
      And as she bares her soles to the earth, th’red river flows.

Image credit – Robert Lentz