Magid

My ancestor was a refugee,

A wanderer on the earth.

Unwelcome everywhere.

We were lost, dreaming of an unknown land.

A silent hand guided us down to Egypt,

Where our children bore children.

The family became a people

With our own names, and language, our old stories and memories.

We grew like a girl becoming a young woman.

Blossoming, fertile and strong.

A seed of hatred took root there.

Rumors at first, then fears festering into hostility.

Our neighbors avoided us and at last

They enslaved us.

They crushed us, body and spirit.

Children were torn from their parents’ arms.

Our hope ran dry. 

Silence descended on our world.

Centuries passed.

Then, somehow, a miracle.

A cry rose up from the throats of the enslaved people.

A howl of pain and grief and protest and yearning. 

A cry for freedom.

That cry shattered the silence, and rose all the way up to the Throne of God.

Our cry entered God’s Mind and God remembered.

The redemption began:

Two defiant midwives; a baby adrift on the river;

a bush ablaze, a fiery angel and the voice of God commanding freedom;

a sister and two brothers speaking truth to power.

Staffs became serpents;

Ten times, land and river turned against Pharoah.

Then in one final night, a cry went up in the land

            Like nothing heard before or since.

With bread of freedom, we took flight to the Sea.

This enslaved people rose up, shook off our chains,

and followed a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire.

We marched through the parted waters of the Sea,

We marched,

Singing, into the wilderness.