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“To hold infinity in the palm of your hand, and eternity in an hour, see a world in a grain of sand or heaven in a wild flower.”
- Transposition of William Blake (1757–1827), British poet, painter, printmaker
Inspired by Job 38–41:
Yahweh speaks to Job out of a whirlwind, perhaps similar to the one in which Elijah was taken from Earth in a fiery chariot.
Like the odd burning bush Moses encountered in the wilderness, the chariot and horses of fire sent for Elijah burned, but did not burn up. Neither did that fire harm him.
Perhaps not unlike the flame at JFK’s grave, they, while they burned, were the eternal flame.
The opening salvo of God (“Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge?” 38:2) recalls British poet T. S. Eliot (1888–1965) in the opening of “Choruses from the Rock”: “Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?”
If you were there at Creation, speak.
Otherwise, be silent.
Hold the tongue I brought into being.
The Lord’s opening words (“Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further: and here shall thy proud waves be stayed” 38:11) invoke those of British poet George, Lord Byron (1788–1824) when he wrote, in his romantic…
