This angel sits here, silent, forever by my side. His head is bowed, but his eyes look up toward me, here as I lie on this soft stone bed of comfort. His wings, his feathers whisper without words in the gentle breeze that flows through this sealed room.
He says nothing. I can say nothing to him, cannot speak in my own voice. But his words emerge from the silence of his heart and hover in the air, at the archway of the doors between our souls:
Speak to me.
Who are you?
Where are you now?
The glimmers of myself that remain within my mind try to retain this little knowledge of myself: My name was, is Elisheva. I am the last of these prophets, of these women, the last of my kind.
I once knew other stories of myself, but they have drifted away, lost like a song hummed by a child in a meadow in the gentle rain. Now I only know my name, what people called me, in the time long ago when there were other people here to call my name.
But now my voice is silent. Only voices of others speak from me, voices of those whose souls have touched mine, have been parts of other souls that had included parts of mine. When I open my mouth to speak, I hear these other voices, speak with these other voices.
This angel sits here silent, listening, recording, remembering. Again he prompts me, and again: Speak to me.
I hold my voice in stillness until I cannot keep from speaking, until the voice of a life from another time, another world, forces itself through my lungs, my throat, my lips.
The angel nods in silence. Let the voice flow, his soul says to mine. You speak in safety when you speak to me.
I shudder, breathe more deeply, start to emit the sounds of speech after seemingly eternal silence, with a cough, a moan, a sigh. Speak to me, the angel says. Who are you? Where are you now?
I breathe in the angel’s silence, close my eyes, and breathe forth the voices of ancient souls.
Leave a Reply