Crossing the Jabbok

Unsure of my crossing, I stand and wait at the Jabbok
In a wrestling rhyme of rapids. The waters from the river
Rise around my fears and blur my eyes. I am uncertain
Where my footfall will land. My sandal slides turning on rocks.

I watch others cross ahead of me with obedience,
While I drop back to the crisis I find lurking
In the shadows of my soul. A drought-coward spirit
Dries up the will and burns through my identity
Destroying the brittle nature of my grip on this land
That waits on the other side of the river.

I am stalking through the darkness of my soul
For the person waiting beyond my dreams. The twin
Shadow of a birthright slips through my memory.
My father’s blessing evaporates in my mother’s maneuvers of facts.
My brain is a soup of deception: my mind is a sheep blind
Without a shepherd to open the gate. Unvoiced by silence,
I wait, unable to cross, paralyzed and unprepared without a prayer.
The void of doubt drifts into night where demons perch
In my dreams foaming at the ford of the river in my head.

From the shadows, flesh forms an equal partner to my fear
As I wrestle through the night. Clouds curtain the moonlight
On the man matched in this grip. I grab his leg for a takedown.
He turns his shoulder then twists my ankle into syllables of agony.

I pull back on his arm. At dawn he throws me with a hip heist.
Deep pain hollows out my thigh, dislocated, out of joint I hold on
For day breaking light. A voice speaks from this sweat: What is your name?
I utter: Jacob. You are no longer Jacob, he affirms. I leave
Behind my fear and limp forward knowing I have seen God.
I cross the Jabbok with a name whose sinews will endure
The peace making between brothers in a place beyond the river.