GIDEON

My mother used to say,
"Stony lands breed stony hearts".
A hard time she had of it,
Thankless toil in hearth and home,
Mostly alone,
My father in the sullen fields
Hiding our little from the bandits,
Scuffing a living from the scrapes
Of soul in rocky hillsides,
Hiding our precious stock and seed
From Midianite marauders.
 
We sowed in silence
And reaped our frugal harvest
At the dead of night,
Haunted by fears of hunters
Erupting from the dark
To steal, enslave and kill.
Our God had gone
And with Him went our will.
 
Year after dreary year
This carried on
From father down to daughter
And mother down to son
Each time we bred a beast
We thought we'd won but then
They came and took it.
 
God got no tithe from us,
Our most went to these robbers,
We just got by
Paying the plunderers
From our scant supply
Often the very old and young
Would simply lose the fight
And die.
 
What good did it do,
My dreams of hope and peace?
We muttered to ourselves
About past greatness
And downcast minced our words,
Called curses on their heads
When we weren't overheard.
Reared under oppression,
You learn to scuttle,
Make yourself look small,
Stoop your shoulders,
Bend your back
And crouch if you are tall.
You eye the angry ground
If any of them are around.
You hug the shadows,
Must never be alone
Outside and keep your women
Close to home.
 
Doubt and fear parented me,
My childhood held no play,
Our time was work to live
Each drab and burning day,
A battle to survive,
Paying for 'protection'
Just to stay alive.
 
"Stony lands and hearts!"
Even our music was muted
And my parents never laughed.
My sisters never danced.
My father said
"Someone had greatly sinned",
My mother sighed
"God has abandoned us",
And everywhere I heard the words
Our people cried, "Why, oh why"?
 
My father spat
"You get what you deserve",
And he'd stump away
Off to the secret fields
Stamping his unhappiness,
Treading his well worn trail
Of lifetime disappointment.
 
Cactus spines were blunter
Than the thorns in my heart
And the pangs of rage
In my young soul.
 
I listened to our Elders'
Commonsense and fear,
"Don't make a move,
Don't rock the boat"!
Caution was counselled,
As we discussed
My claim for liberation.
It all stuck in my craw,
I chafed and dreamed
The while they fearful,
Eyed the creaking door.
 
"You're ignorant," they said,
"It's knowledge makes us cower.
We'll pay in currency of pain
The price of your young power."
 
That was their instruction,
That anything I did
Would drag us all defiant
Down to our destruction!
 
And then one day,
I'm hiding, threshing wheat
For hidden bread,
And suddenly
This geezer comes and calls
Inside the grape press' walls.
 
I was away in fantasy
Of freedom. He brings reality.
He calls me 'Mighty… Warrior'
Me, Gideon. A mighty warrior?
You're having a laugh,
Aintcha?
Are you putting me on?
Hope is for the strong, so
Don't string me along!
 
I had been locked in,
Blocked up behind a wall
And then…I heard God's call.
 
I'm old now, past it,
But I can still see
And hear those words
The Angel spoke to me,
"Warrior… Mighty"
 
I'd thought I was the least.
Its funny how with God,
After the famine,
Often comes the feast.