The mist of grace moving ꭫ covered the grey mountain
The man and flock there walked the desert path
A core of light erupting ꭫ colored its layered edges
Then gazing looked beyond his shepherd’s staff
The brimming high place ꭫ in braw heavenly plenum
As dust upon the mountain drifting light
Finely floating facets ꭫ raining gold upon its face
So parched his thirsty lips and hindered sight
The cradle of the most high ꭫ so crowned with mottled sky
He looked upon the peak so seeming far
A soft and breathing storm ꭫ soaring on the broken stone
A thousand steps upon that jagged hearth
In blood and orange flight ꭫ bled on that rugged flet
And sensed upon that hill a burning beam
A tree there filled with wonder ꭫ with tears of fire wept
Upon its leaves frightening holy gleam
Saffron flayed upon a ledge ꭫ a soaring flame then leapt
He turned aside his path toward the light
And swift a desolate still ꭫ swept the darkening sky
A voice then spoke unto his heart with sound
As angelic light was trapped ꭫ at length in earthly tree
The man then hid his face from sacred sight
Shining as the sun’s beam ꭫ in silent beauty seen
For on that place he stood was holy ground.
©2026 R.A.R. Knight
Author’s Note:
The poem is an interlaced or alternating alliterative and rhyming pentameter retelling of the Burning Bush theophany (Moses on Horeb). The poem shifts between a global, elevated vantage and a personal, embodied vantage without switching from the third person narration.
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