I was Jonah at my desk.
Still wet from the trip,
and a little bewildered to
face this great city, I
sat down to reconcile
truths: that be-bop
is playing on the radio,
that I have let my
coffee grow cold again,
that I am home and
that being home entails
connections, especially when she
comes in, holding one of my
books or trying to finish
one of my own, or hoping
that for once, this once,
we could actually sit
down and have a decent
conversation without raised
voices, that we might. . .
but then I lose that verb.
It’s gone to sea.
As I was trying to explain,
I was Jonah at my desk,
really coming to grips
with things this time.
Jonah begins with the following
statement: He thinks of water.
He thinks of its power
over land, which is how he
would have preferred to go to
Nineveh, if he had to go at all.
Jonah should have turned his
back to the boat, not gone on
the voyage. Oceans are dangerous.
If Jonah is true to himself
he will admit that if he
had listened at the start
he would not have been
as thoroughly soaked as he
became. He should have listened,
not listed, as was the case,
then he could have heard
God. . . wait, he has to
look for a verb to float
by. One would be sufficient
Jonah, his tongue laden in
drought, considers his friend
Ezekiel. Ezekiel, if the reader
recalls, had his tongue stuck
to the roof of his mouth
before leaving to visit that
valley. Imagine that! He, later
facing all those Jews and
not able to use that one
verb. It was like God
wanted everything to be dry
on the inside first then
move out – like E.’s hair in
the fire during those days
in the Ezekiel Cave. Now
that he thinks about it,
E. wonders if things could
have been different. If he
had stayed with the woman
from the other village, he
might have let himself go.
moved to a little cottage
on the coast. Sailed, fished,
loved her and written something
slightly happier than those words
that stick deep down inside.
On a good day he probably
could have netted the
right word to. . .?
While Jonah waits for Ezekiel
to finish his thought, he looks
to Isaiah for a contribution.
Though Isaiah did write some fierce
poetry, to get there he was
struck dumb; the encounter with
the Almighty was traumatic,
(which seems fair, after all.
He is the great He is, and
Isaiah is the great I guess,
if I have to, I will).
According to his very good
book, Isaiah was a man of
unclean lips. To get the job
done properly, the Great One
Himself sent an angel clutching
a live coal from a holy fire
to cleanse Isaiah’s filthy lips
and, therefore, his appalling language.
Isaiah wonders if the same
end might have been achieved
with the presence of a fine,
solid, Middle Eastern woman.
The kind who would have
let I. know just what God
thinks of a naughty mouth.
Can you hear her? Her voice,
raised, dishes thrown at walls,
and later, much later, crying
the point into clarity until
I. clears up the mess
with He who sends
angels and fire.
Isaiah realises that a woman
could have had an unexpected
affect on his verse. He might
have slipped past the scribes
this passage: It often takes
a woman to show a man the
fullness of God’s own heart.
Once Isaiah finishes and Ezekiel
stops pacing the room, Jonah
sits them down and, with a
contemplative statement on his face,
looks out at the coming rain-
cloud for the needed verb:
Jonah claims that the sea
changes everyone it touches,
that Ezekiel and Isaiah should
stop internalising the desert
the way they often do, and
that to be wet is to understand
and. . . before he can finish,
his friends lose interest.
They spend the night in
front of the fireplace,
avoiding the rain outside.
Jonah meanwhile, finally tired
of smelling of fish takes
a long shower, as if to
confirm the validity of
his previous grand statements.
He lets the water rain
down, thinks about what
he’s been through, forgets
what he was. . .
Then you come to the door,
as wet as he is, his Bible
in your hand, all those tears
running down your face
to your quivering mouth
like wave upon wave
and you
saying
saying
saying
Stuart
Ian McKay