mal'akh

I once was a traveller,

then, a very young man, I travelled far beyond.

To very distant, dark places in Babylon

and the most silent of fields, devouring these eyes which fell upon.

I there once met a young boy working in the fields.

Marked by his fate and most ominous signs on his cheeks.

There he showed me a pit that he dug,

he took my hand and down we fell on our knees.

His brown eyes, filled with rage,

he whispered to me like the wind, from his invisible cage:

"Here I lie the whole day under the burning sun.

And work, so that my siblings have their daily bread to eat.

But once I fell asleep in this very pit

and in my deepest dreams, I then was brought a gift.

Nothing more than a message this was,

but from the most disastrous of mouths –

A wheel in wheels I saw, with many eyes they all were gifted

and a poisonous breath, which they throusted upon me and said:

Holy! Holy! Holy!

Thou shalt be gifted

by the spring of thy soul.

Thou shalt be blessed with a quest.

Holy! Holy! Holy!

After this very day, thou shalt become a traveller

So thy way will lead to the holiest ground

to concur which the craft, thy lord, thou will grant.

And the wheel in wheels slowly devoured me, singing my name to the heavens endlessly."

–

What is your name, I asked the child, horrified by the mere image of his visions.

Mal'akh, they call me, he whispered.

Please, dear sir, have mercy on my soul, he cried.