Gideon's Dreams
I left you to wander alone through the night. Never did I embrace the wind, nor the tortures of solfège1 psalms. And when my peer took his life, I called out to you, Jesus. You said nothing, but with a heart struck by a trifle more might.
I didn't know you would bark. I didn't know you wouldn't let me finish my meat. I didn't know you delighted in such fervour. Take yourself from me. Take this filth and this mire. Take yourself in wondrous packaging and in a fair case. On an Instagram scroll, He shall reveal Himself to you, just as to me.
To learn to bark anew, leeches and ticks shall applaud you. Learn to strike, and you shall one day kill kindness. And believe me when you remind me of that someone.
And I never bear ill will towards those who grow familiar with the likes of you. Those who indulge in mésalliance2, every minute they lie upon my driveway. I never falsified feeling or dreams, only state documents. For I shall never renounce love, not in the worst of prayers, not in the direst law.
It manifests as a higher resting pulse, a heightened state, a heightened stance of trousers, a renunciation of fragile bones, and a leap into the abyss, between each of Gideon's3 dreams, between each son of Israel, every psychotic slaughter.
1 Solfège: Musical training method using syllables (do, re, mi) to teach pitch and sight-reading. Here, "tortures of solfège psalms" combines sacred text with musical discipline—both systems of imposed order, both sources of suffering and structure.
2 Mésalliance: French term for marriage or relationship with someone considered socially inferior. A union that violates class boundaries. Here, those who "indulge in mésalliance" lying on the driveway—intimacy as trespass.
3 Gideon: Biblical judge who led Israel against the Midianites. God reduced his army from 32,000 to 300 to prove victory came from divine intervention, not military strength. His story involves dreams, signs, and faith tested through impossible odds.