Moriah

A promise spoken in the dark Older than the morning light No thunder in the answer given Only distance in the night ⸻ Morning breaks on hardened ground Dust of home still on his hands A voice that split the quiet earth Left no map, no softer plan Three days walking into absence Where the horizon lost its name Every step a sealed confession Every breath a hidden flame Wood is bound with patient rope Across the back of quiet faith And neither eye will speak the fear That follows closely in their wake ⸻ No choir breaks the sky above them No sign carved into the wind Only distance stretching thinner Where the meaning will begin ⸻ Up the mountain Where the stone remembers blood Where the air grows thin with knowing And the world feels far from God Up the mountain With the fire and the wood And the question never spoken That still echoes where they stood ⸻ The boy looks up through tired light “Where is the lamb?” cuts through the dust A pause too long to be an answer Hangs between the word and trust The father does not turn to face him For truth would fracture what remains And every step becomes a tremor Running quietly through his veins The path grows steep, the sky withdraws Like something watching from afar And still he walks, as if obedience Is heavier than the stars ⸻ No angel speaks, no hand appears No easing of the climb Only the rhythm of the fear That keeps perfect, steady time ⸻ ) Up the mountain Where even breath begins to break Where faith is carved in splintered silence And every step is what you take Up the mountain Where love and terror intertwine And the promise burns like embers At the edge of thought and mind ⸻ Stone upon stone upon stone Built with shaking, careful hands Wood laid down like final language That no living voice commands The boy bound in quiet linen Not resisting, not untrue Only trust too vast to name it Only eyes that already knew And the sky does not descend It only watches, still, and deep As if heaven itself is waiting For a promise it must keep ⸻ [Breakdown] Arm lifted into stillness Where the seconds fracture slow Every heartbeat sounds like judgment That the world will never know The edge catches fading daylight Like a question at its end And time itself holds its breathing At the moment it could bend ⸻ Then— A voice like shattered daylight Splitting silence into flame Calling out across the mountain Calling only by his name Not thunder, not destruction But a mercy sharp and clear As the unseen hand of heaven Reaches suddenly through fear ⸻ Down from the mountain Where the dust begins to glow Where what was asked is answered Not in loss, but overflow Down from the mountain With the weight of what was spared And the fire now in the branches Where another life was laid ⸻ Caught within the thorned thicket Where the wild light breaks the shade A life given in the silence Where another life was saved And the sky that once was distant Now feels closer than the breath As the mountain keeps its secret Of obedience and death