To Enoch (from his mother)

I wasn’t introduced to your father, I found him wandering, pleading with someone who wasn’t there.  I called; he came over, knelt, put his ear to the soil and wept.

He grew up on a farm out west, with his parents and brother, Abel, the favourite, a bold, even-tempered man who kept sheep. I met him once, he could fight a bear, shear a fleece, ease milk from a teat and then at the right time kill and share meat. Your father saw angels in smoke, heard them in fire.  Once, to make the voices stop, he did what they said and killed his brother, the best of the flock.

Those days in this dry land, so far east of Eden, no-one called upon the name of God: without a tribe, I survived the rough ways of men as I could.  I showed Cain a room, gave him a price.  He busied himself: built this city with plumb line, filled it with babbling tribes to try and stifle the voices that were telling him he was cursed.

I found herbs that soothed him, and in time I loved him; but he remained tormented.  Now he has left and given the city your name.  Sometimes I see you bear the mark of his lonely shame.  Take this sheepskin as an inheritance.  It was left by your uncle.  His strong arms lifted it from a ewe, so she stood naked. Abel was convivial, the touch of his fingers was timely and gentle.

2025