Parshat Mikeitz: All’s Well That Ends

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The End
24 Dec 2008
Arts & Media

Let us begin at the end:

 

All live happily ever after.

Beauty, peace and harmony

Walk hand in hand, their faces

Glowing in the radiant sun shining

Forth a blaze from heaven’s depths

To the clarity that is man and purity

That is his being and essence; over the

Crystal-tender streams of consciousness…

 

(Real consciousness, the kind that is not

Only conscious of the fact but also of the

Dream, the kind that is not conscious of ones

Own being but of the Being that is Supreme and

Eternal, the kind that is not only conscious of one’s

Limitations but also of one’s – and another’s – possibilities

 

It would seem we’ve lost our

Own stream of consciousness

So back to the end)

 

…Over the crystal-tender streams of consciousness,

Straight through the subtle baby-breath whispers of

Promises fulfilled and destinies realized, and beyond

Anything the greatest artist could ever paint or even

Envision, there floats what the prophets would call

Redemption but what in simple terms is: Divine knowledge,

The realization that the G-dliness we’ve never actually

Seen is now reality and the universe we’ve always touched

Now suddenly seems to slip right through our very fingers.

 

This is the end; but in reality it is the beginning:

 

It happened at the end

Of two years to the day

 

In English, the word “end”

Is final

 

In the Holy Tongue, it

Is culmination

 

This end of which the Torah speaks

Is a result, an outcome of the events

Preceding – this “end,” where Yosef

Arises to great heights, to unbelievable

Expansion which would shape the people

And change the course of history – and

Future – forever, is a result, an outcome

Of the challenges he refined and the bars

Behind which he was shackled…

 

In the realm of a purely physical existence,

Things end, come to an end, go to an end;

 

But Truth, Holiness, never ends: it merely culminates.

 

False pretense, store-bought beauty fades with time and space;

True beauty never ends: it is merely the product of all our work

 

Much gets lost in translation;

The lesson from Mikeitz should not:

 

There are times when we are imprisoned

Within our own limitations, only left to

Interpret dreams sometimes not even our

Own; however, this is merely a transient

State, not an end; indeed, this can lead one

Straight to the top – from the confines of

Prison to a prince among men, ending, no,

Culminating with the “approach” and embrace

Of brothers, worlds once divided now made

Complete

 

All’s well that ends

Well

 

The End

 

(That is, the time for all of heaven’s and earth’s beauty

To culminate)


Mendel Jacobson is a writer, poet and journalist living in Brooklyn. His weekly poetry can be seen at jakeyology.blogspot.com

The words of this author reflect his/her own opinions and do not necessarily represent the official position of the Orthodox Union.