A river flows out of Eden to water the garden,
                                        and from there it divides and becomes four branches.
                                        The name of the first is Pishon[.] The name of the second river is Gihon[.]
                                        The name of the third river is Tigris[.] And the fourth river is the Euphrates.
                                                                                —Genesis 2:10–14¹

G · uanine / י
          / Pishon

          Taking the torch in the darkness,
paying his overdue homage,
a poet a maker using
language and letters not only
to honour him but to create,
a creator and destroyer
making less or more vague the way
this ink-blot Universe says things,
he prays with the same misery
god himself experienced when

A · denine / ה
          / Gihon

          faced with an abyss that could not
understand him, flames staining brands
with characters the open hands
and minds of small children hold out
as if to swallow them, writing
existence with the gentleness
and fresh innocence of blushing
pomegranates, monoliths carved
by baby’s breath as if speaking
it made the planets’ beginning

T · hymine / ו
          / Tigris

          manifest, their throats’ rawest rose
thorn kisses scratching the forest
of his chest’s broad wilderness, those
kids like wandering stars crawling
through its treasury of precious
stones, gifted tongues as their pecks melt
rock-hard secrets down to bare bone,
cherubs and seraphim riding
it out, this force scorching authors
and god their father both, a fire

C · ytosine / ה
          / Euphrates

          of words what brought life forth, what sword
menacing angels course through veins,
guarding heaven’s indwelling trace
with chains none can break nor serpent
with offer of their magic names
unlink, since this is a language
the relics of which only saints
and mystics can translate—and snakes
cannot kneel to pray—this garden
within from which man expels god.

__________
¹Written between the 10^th and 5^th centuries BC. Translated from the Hebrew by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America in, “The Hebrew Scriptures, Commonly Called the Old Testament: Genesis”, Chapter 2, Verses 10–14 of Holy Bible: NRSV: New Revised Standard Version with the Apocrypha, San Francisco: HarperOne, 2007; page 5:

וְנָהָר יֹצֵא מֵעֵדֶן, לְהַשְׁקוֹת אֶת-הַגָּן; וּמִשָּׁם, יִפָּרֵד, וְהָיָה, לְאַרְבָּעָה רָאשִׁים. שֵׁם הָאֶחָד, פִּישׁוֹן–הוּא הַסֹּבֵב, אֵת כָּל-אֶרֶץ הַחֲוִילָה, אֲשֶׁר-שָׁם, הַזָּהָב. וּזְהַב הָאָרֶץ הַהִוא, טוֹב; שָׁם הַבְּדֹלַח, וְאֶבֶן הַשֹּׁהַם. וְשֵׁם-הַנָּהָר הַשֵּׁנִי, גִּיחוֹן–הוּא הַסּוֹבֵב, אֵת כָּל-אֶרֶץ כּוּשׁ. וְשֵׁם הַנָּהָר הַשְּׁלִישִׁי חִדֶּקֶל, הוּא הַהֹלֵךְ קִדְמַת אַשּׁוּר; וְהַנָּהָר הָרְבִיעִי, הוּא פְרָת.