*

        Do not let his shield
                             detract you.

        He too was once frail
                           flesh and bone.

                *

At the brush of eyelids
        return him to muscle and skin.

With a light touch
                 he will recover speech.

                 *

         He proclaims in the square
                           and challenges kin!

                  *

You wait for the words to end,
                  then quickly embrace.

He abandons his jeremiads,
          becomes dumb with joy.

Yet lingers to remain stone
         --but not his face.

                 *

            There his eyes sink
                            close lidded
            and he curls into
                              dormant dreams.

                  *

Hail, women
                 Levites of Zion,
daughters of prophecy
                  who encircle the hill—

                 *

         To the unfaithful,
                          hard of heart,
         Jerusalem will not yield
                  even one of her gates!

Seymour Mayne