Sand dunes.

"Who led you through this great and terrible desert, with its snakes, fiery serpents and scorpions, a parched land without any water in it ..." (Deuteronomy 8:15)

Abraham:
Under this sand dune
(Its surface smoother than a blade of iron
And hotter than a newly-forged sword),
I bury,
Praying never to recover,

The knife

I held to slaughter my son.

Isaac:
Under this sand dune
(Drier than the sun-bleached jawbone of a jackal
That slowly died of thirst),
Lies the promise
Of a subterranean stream
That waits to be excavated.
It flows in silence.

Like a father's love.

I dig.

Jacob:
Under this sand dune
I search
(As I have done under dune after dune,
In desert after desert, year after year)
For the remains
Of my son,
Ripped apart by the jaws of wild beasts.

Aside from a coat of many colors
And the memory of dreams,
All I have discovered

Is sand.