Resurrection of the Word : The Book of Maledictions by Mahoyael

SUCH IS the curse on you, O youthful young, the curse of Canaan. I shall cast three curses on you because the drunken Father died from his intoxication. Noahh is no more. The fiery flood of his new ardour has killed him: bombs and missiles, gas and missiles and bombs. In reaction to so much killing the Father has committed suicide. His Heaven is no more. Space is dead: there is no space for him anywhere. Has he ever believed in his beautiful promises? Hham, you see his hypocrisy laid bare. Cursed be Hham who saw the Father's origin and did not undertake his aim!                                 The Cursing Of Hham Cursed be you, clear-sighted Hham, for having trod too long on the Father's ground. This ground no longer exists: being out of your depth you lose your head. Hairy, ragged, lousy beggar, fear and doubt combined to make you shun seclusion. Cursed be you, Hham, thirsty for love but not knowing how to love. You say, and it is true, that the Era of the Father killed love by enchaining the sexes. But love is not love if, although temporal, the intemporal docs not penetrate the flesh and rearise. Cursed be you, Hham, for boasting that "1 make love!" For love is not "made". You believe in fleeing from the purulent world and its moral rottenness subsides on you and you conceal its filth. Lascivious, promiscuous, hysterical emotion, aimless wanderings, drugs, stupidities, smoking parties and noise, uproar. . The Father's tradesmen know what they are doing in driving dense crowds of you to suicide. You, shouting about "the young", boosting "the young", playing to lose because your 95 youth is so quickly departing at every moment. And already, Hham, you are aged and senile before you've lived.                                 The Cursing of Japhet Accursed be you, great Japhet; Japhct the vast, the numberless who peoples "The Isles of Nations", Continents adrift. Cursed be you for involving Hham in your stupid produciion of more people. Cursed be your cries of distress: Help, I am hungry, I am naked, see how lean and destitute I am! For your appeals take away thc sacred character of love by turning it into pity -- man at his most sub-human. Cursed bc your repressive mob, cursed be your hare-brained slogans -- Mao-Mao, Che-che, Marx-Marx -- that extinguish Hham's vision. Better that you should die than cause the death of a single person in your undifferentiated mob. See how Hham lets himself accept your solicitations: already he needs the strong smell of massed bodies packed together. Alas, the time has come to look by torch-light for unique individuals, one by one.                                 The Cursing of Schem Accursed be you, who carries this name, Schem, for wanting to keep the Name for yourself. Cursed be you for closing your tents against Japhet, for it is written that Japhet will inhabit your tents. Cursed be you among all for wishing to enclose yourself, protected, armed, behind barbed-wire, spitting fire, in Canaan. Cursed be you for having become fossilised, the relict of former times. Cursed be your seedlessness. Ah, cursed be your sterility!           I will celebrate the land of Israel           Now will I extol it,           The land called infinite exile,           Where the bitter thorns shoot,           Devastated by hurricanes. 96           In the middle of a pitiless desert           I have seen a human carcass           Flat on its face, laughing . . .           Petrified in the movement of drinking           The pure water of a mirage           In a great gulp .           Just as you, O Israel,           Wert refreshed in Canaan.           I will tell of the land of Israel           Sweeter than the smile of a child,           Where rustling and shining           Are the velvet of olive trees.           The smooth carpet of mosses,           The waters and shades.           I saw a mature woman           Carefully prepare the cradle           Of the infant she was expecting.           She was working without respite,           With ecstatic joy,           Mad for twenty years           After her son died . . .           Just as you           In Canaan art consoled,           O Israel.           On a winter's night           In a vast city I saw           A ragamuffin dying on a bench.           The rain fell on him drop by drop.           When he was soaked           He fell in the mud           And bust his mouth wide open.           The four humours flowed out of him           In a very thin thread           Which entered within the earth 97           And, one knows not how, these hungry humours           Grew within           Into the very foundations of the enormous city           Into the thick walls underground.           This hunger came from mouths           As multiplex as waves.           Ravenous multitudes           Entered the city           Inside each wall,           And ate and ate,           And climbed every wall           Up to the highest towers           Emptying each little closet           Of its contents;           These innumerable           Over-hungry mouths           Of which nobody knew anything. . .           When everything was consumed,           Dust inside, whole outside,           The city collapsed in an instant!           Such are your harvests           In Canaan, O Israel.           I counted one fruitful seed           Among all the thousand million seeds broadcast,           But without thousands of millions           There would not be this one.           A countless multitude of impossibilities           Dispersed by the winds           Have you sown in Canaan, O Israel.           Land of the impossible and the probable           Barrenness in fruitful pastures,           Dead trunk of the tree of life,           Past begotten of the future! 98           Oldest among the youngest,           The benediction within the curse,           Poise in the collapsing balance,           Light in darkness!           Such is the land of Canaan.           Always the untimely thrusting           Of the seed prematurely ripe,           Essential destruction of what is           By what cannot be,           For the seed has not matured.           Work overthrown. Falling back. Impelled onwards.           Bodies expelled, kept in.           Incomplete births.           In zig-zagging trajectories           Noble departures fall on the Intemporal.           That is Canaan.           Who advances retreats,           The first are the last,           Who finds his life loses it,           What is simple is complicated,           Multiplication is division,           Who eats docs not sustain himself,           Who endures lives not,           Who dies lives, who loses gains;           Living and getting is neither being nor owning,           in Canaan.           Land which is not of this world,           And is of this world,           Land Cain made fruitful           Expelled Cain.           Land nourished on the blood of Abel           At the price of this blood nourished Abel.           Never completed land of Hham the perfected, 99           Land being fertilised by the decomposing dead,           Has a fruitless impregnation.           Land that refuses fattening by the dead           By this act restores them to life           Making itself barren.           Land sacrificed, the only one alive,           Transubstantiated,           Canaan.           Let Israel be destroyed that the world may be born,           Is the cry of Canaan!           Oh the passion to be made to consume itself!           Thus cried the Word.           Israel, that impossible structure,           May your forces dread the inward explosion           Of triumphant Israel!           Her invisible powers           Are homeless.           Tottering empires fear no conspiracy,           No wild plot           To establish the power of Israel.           For its power is in Canaan,           And Canaan is the very basis of your thrones,           Of your palaces, of your legions.           Ah, take pickaxes,           Hew open your ramparts,           To discover Canaan there.           With its innumerable mouths,           Open and clamouring mouths           Corroding and consuming your foundations           Mouths craving           For the land of Canaan.           Well-established powers, trembling empires,           Multitudes and continents, 100           Millions and millions of people,           All the countries of the planet           And your blood-thirsty glories,           Your motorised armies,           Your lands bristling with fortresses,           Cannons, tanks and steel,           Frontiers, armoured trains,           Machine-guns, helmets,           Gas-masks, alarms,           Outcries, screams,           Factory sirens,           Billions hungry . . .           And Canaan. 101

Carlo Suares, Resurrection of the Word, Shambhala, 1974, pp. 95-101