Dancing Dust
	Poems by Mollie Caird (1922-2000)
	Hazael
Home Alphabetic index of poems Thematic index of poems Biography Gallery Contact and links	And Hazael said, 'But what, is thy servant a dog, that he should do this great thing?' My name is Hazael, and it means ‘God sees’. They used to call me Son of Nobody. The dynasty I broke were sons of God, Benhadad, Benhadad, Benhadad, sons of God, And so shall my son be. Does God then see?  What is it Hadad sees? He sees my fertile gardens richly starred With scarlet cyclamens, anemones, And terebinths alive with bulbuls singing; The glinting goldfish in the great bronze bowl, Figures of alabaster, jasmine vines, My milk-white horses shaking silver bridles Among the apricot and walnut trees, The very rivers, Pharpar and Abana, Watering this green place at my desire. He sees my royal saluki hound, proud, swift, Bounding after the hyrax and the hare, The golden tassls of his silky ears Soft as the fringes of that quiet pillow That pressed the dead king’s face. What of Elisha’s God?  What does he see? What can he see but stones and stunted thorns, The rasping raven and the sharp-winged kite, Eager for carrion.  Those who live in deserts Know only barren gods. Does not a sunflower turn its great bold face To mirror the sun, its image and begetter? So can a prosperous king reflect his God. Have not my deeds been godlike?  I have made A shining city where a thousand gravers Damascene with gold a thousand swords. Hark where the shuttles rattle through the looms, Look where the glowing silks festoon the alleys Between the dye-vats and the weavers’ shops; Smell the sweet cedar-wood fresh from the adze, And count the myriad snowflakes sifting down From ivory-carvers’ knives.  Triumphant ring The busy hammers patterning bright brass. And all among this thriving, thronging place The stately caravans move slowly on ― Strange-tongued, turbaned men urging tall camels From distant provinces with precious loads, With pearls and tincts and spices, through the hills To Middle Sea.  For I have captured Gath, Sent Shalmaneser crawling home again, Trampled Philistia, had the king of Judah Come whining with his ransom in his hand, Buying his peace with his ancestral treasures, With sacred vessels of that temple where They keep Jehovah in a little box. Is not Damascus one great miracle? What has Elisha done compared with this? Sweetened the water in some brackish well, Filled an old woman’s jar with rancid oil, Conjured a dozen or so of barley loaves, Made an axe swim, and jostled back to life A little boy with sunstroke. Is such a one to frighten me with God? Stick to your cobbler’s last, Elisha, frighten The peasant children with a brace of bears; Let kings be kings and rule their own affairs. Sometimes at dawn I ride out to the marshes, And my saluki runs along with me; Those tasselled ears streaming behind remind me ― Enough of that!  I shut my eyes to blot That image, but the early sun strikes through Tight eyelids, and I see blood-red, blood-red. This is a strange place in the misty morning, The reed-beds and the limpid pools a-quiver With crying birds.  My hound put up the flocks, A multitude of glossy ibises, Millions of spoonbills drifting over the marsh Like flakes of pink fire, wind-blown rose-petals That flash and float and settle. Innumerable lives.  Who counts them?  Are they numbered? Slowly I turn my horse.  Here in this waste No human habitation, only one Black bedouin tent, past which my dog, uneasy, Slinks silent, tail down.  There, beside it, sits A shepherd shrouded in his burnous, hood Pulled over shadowed face. I do not know him, and I do not know If he is watching me.  Now safely past, Up-tails my hound, I laugh, and fling a stone. Where are you, old Elisha, do you pray? Call to your desert God, Elisha, say ‘Thy servant was a dog, and had his day’. The text forming the subtitle of this poem is from 2 Kings 8:13 1968 The Dancing Dust and other poems, 1983