A Lullaby of Wisdom
The Song of Deborah told through voices, hands, and visions
By KatieRose Kimball
| A Song of Warning | The Gate |
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| And so Wisdom said: A woman sat beneath a tree between cities. She was known by many names. Some called her mother, some called her prophetess, and some called her Deborah. She cried out her warning to the forty thousand of Israel, cursing their complacency and their curling backs. She called out from beneath her tree and stomped her feet as populations turned away. The singers at the well echoed her warning, like drops in a pail. Awake! Rise! Wisdom said, and led her through the gates to where Barak sweat over battle plans. She had an army at her back. She charted a decisive path and proclaimed, “A woman, a wife, a mother, a weaver, will strike Sesira down.” Some thought it was trade for Barak’s cowardice, but they had not listened. The future graced her song, the rebirth of an empire built into her voice. |
Deborah looks up from where she braids her graying hair to find a woman walking toward her. The shade from the tree above makes the world outside its confines seem all the brighter and the woman is silhouetted in brilliant fire.“Greetings, Sofia,” Deborah says, rising to her feet and brushing dust and petals off her skirt. “Hello, Deborah,” the woman replies. “Will you walk with me?” They walk through the wild garden—only partially maintained by Deborah’s scattered direction—that stretches out from around the tall juniper tree as if a great flood was poured down onto its roots and plants grew from the ground wherever the splash of water reached. Now, the yellow of bees spot the swatches of desert green and dusted blooms. A single bee comes to buzz before Deborah’s dark brown eyes. Deborah lifts her callused and wrinkled hands to direct the female worker out of her path. She looks on fondly as the bee bumbles along. When Sofia speaks, it does not break the quiet, but firmly denies that it ever existed. “How are your bees?” Deborah smiles. She knows Sofia only asks out of politeness; she surely knows more than Deborah ever could. “Their honey is bright and sweet. I hope to store what I can before the chariots come crashing through.” “That is wise.” They continue to wander a steady pattern along the path until Sofia turns towards the gates. In sudden response, Deborah stops with an ache catching at her heart. “Oh, Sofia, please stay.” Sofia looks at her with kindness in her eyes. “May I help you garden?” “Yes, Sofia.” Deborah leads them to a section where the weeds threaten to overcome the beauty and future promise of the goji berries. She buries her hands in the dirt and begins to sing. |
| A Song of Welcoming | The Threshold |
| And so Wisdom said: A woman sat by the open door of her tent. She was known by many names. Some called her wife, some called her hostess, and some called her Jael. She gestured Sisera into her home with a welcoming smile. Choking dust and battlefield blood filled his eyes; he saw only the opportunity for a warm meal and a warm bed. He croaked a request for water before even crossing the threshold between war and hearth. She lifted a careful ladle of curdled milk into a freshly-cleaned bowl, decorated by the stories of their history. He accepted and drank. And oh, how she broke his welcome to the riches of the land with a mallet to his temple. He crumpled before her, the strong walls of an empire falling at her hands. |
Jael pushes wood into the fire beneath the pot, snatching her hand back as cinders leap towards her, and looks up to see a girl standing in the doorway with flickers of light jumping across her cheeks and obscuring her expression.“Welcome,” Jael greets the stranger with a nod of her head, dark hair falling out from her careful wrap and into her eyes. “May I offer you some warmed milk and a seat?” The stranger accepts with a fond silence. Jael pours out a small cup of milk, then begins preparation for the next day’s bread. The stranger slips in between her practiced movements and takes up the kneading with barely a pause. The smell of cow fills the tent as the milk simmers. They ease into slow conversation, the back and forth of small preferences and muted references to the battles raging just over the hills. The anonymity lent by the promise of temporary acquaintance imbues honesty into her words. She feels compelled to leave strangers with a seed that they may nurture and grow. She says, “Blessed are those who fix a hole in their tent immediately, for they will not get wet when the rain comes. Blessed are those who fix the hole in the ceiling after two weeks, for they are less wet than before. But pity those who learn to avoid the steady drip, for they do not get rain on their heads but they fail to notice the flood covering their feet.” The stranger smiles at her. “I could not have put it better myself.” Jael sets the milk aside to curdle, gathers the dishes from the day, and watches the stranger walk away as she presses strong hands through soapy water and laundry. |
| A Song of Waiting | The Window |
| And so Wisdom said: A woman sat near the lattice in her windows. She was known by many names. Some called her mother, some called her wife, and some—though she had not heard it yet—called her vilomah. There was a cloud of grief threatening to break over the palace, though she had not seen it yet. She asked, “Why is my son so long in coming?” Her women responded in ignorance, delaying an uncomfortable suspicion with a comfortable fantasy. She waited for their words to resolve into a song or their hands to make a warm cup of tea. She waited for them to taste the ozone in the air. She waited to turn away until she heard the sound of hoofbeats against trodden dirt. She waited, the death of an empire yet unobserved by her eyes. |
When the mother turns her gaze away from the deafening departure of an army—banners arrayed around the glitter of her son—turns her gaze away from the bright world beyond the lattice, toward the darkened room, her eyes stumble to adjust. Within the patterned shadows, she finds her gaze resting on a lady she cannot remember.Before she can open her mouth, the lady comes close and points to the embroidery hoop resting in her lap.“What a lovely pattern. No one has ever shown me how to do this stitch.”Her worry distracting her from proper etiquette, she says “I will show you.”The lady curls up into the window well beside her. She begins to guide her movements, feeding her bits of thread. The lesson ends when her attendants come close enough to drag her into their dancing game.The next day, the lady returns when a moment of quiet graces the mother’s vigil. The next day, too. And so she teaches this lady where to tie the knot and how far to stretch the thread and how tight to tug it, and she observes the spreading pattern of a garden filled with bees.She lets the rumours and discussion of the courtiers wash over them like distant music. She can hear how they drive their words louder than they might, an anxious response to the silence that threatens to invade from the edges of every room. She tugs colors through fabric and watches as an image emerges in yellows and reds within her hoop. Sometimes the lady appears by her side and seems merely intent on watching her hands work. Sometimes she sits by the window in solitude and ignores the growing dread that clouds her vision. |