Exodus

Moses lived inside that cloud for forty days
while the Lord showed him the tabernacle:
almond blossoms and blue thread,
and wrote on the tablets with his own hand.
But we were afraid.
Forty days is a season:
a child speaks, spring arrives.
The desert was full of shadows,
the mountain was high.
Had we been fools?
Had he brought us here to die?
We made a calf from necklaces,
we ate and drank.
And while we were still singing,
down the mountain he came,
and dropped the tablets so they broke
and we would never know
the sight of those characters from the hand of the Lord.
He raged at us, but he would not let us go.
He ground the calf to dust, mixed it and made us drink,
and then went up to the mountain again.
For forty days, he carved the stone tablets with his own hand,
and told the Lord: these are your people.
Kill me if you kill them.