Brothers of Joseph

O Joseph, favored son of the radiant colored coat,
see how all your brothers gather again
in these strained and foreign days.
Watch them tear at your garment, again,
shredding it apart in their frenzied envy,
destroying what they do not want others
to possess. They turn their backs
on ancient Jacob in his grief, their hands
splattered with blameless blood.
Joseph, your brothers have arrived, again,
raising their guns
high and taking aim, tossing freedom of conscience
into your dusty pit, burying it
with the silenced victims of their rigid rights,
shaping their own morality
into a brazen golden calf
to which all must bow.
Watch them
take their scythes to nature,
destroying her with their gaping, hungry
mouths, selling their (our) birthrights
to the highest bidder, trampling
on the sacred, chiding old Jacob
in his grief
even while they burn the land.
See them
judge love: who can love,
how to love, while they themselves possess
no love.
Joseph, your brothers are here,
again, unchanged after all,
unmoved by your love or the
blessing cup,
trampling on those who differ, unraveling
the good,
filled with the hot passion
of the anger and revenge
that almost killed you.
Joseph, your brothers are here, again,
so many of them now, vast as locusts
in a sand-swept desert, their noise
incessant and drowning.
Joseph, point us the other way.
encourage us with your dreams,
and we will turn to face them,
sing our songs, etch our words,
raise our lanterns sunward,
and wait to dance with Jacob in freedom.