The sins of the fathers
are tenacious 
unless

there has been a reckoning,
a washing in the river
to a new awareness,
a new name reminding him
of that long night of struggle,
grasping desperately to the past
and finally letting go,
with a blessing, no less.

Ten sons had learned their lessons well,
living into a new iteration 
of deception and manipulation,
greed, competition.
Striving.

Joseph and Benjamin were younger,
brought close in the evenings,
as Papa recounted his foibles, feats and failures
from the other side of the Jabbok.
With new sight 
he connected the star-dots,
that ladder of angels
appearing in the night sky of his memory,
recalling the tale of Father Abraham
under that same sky of promise.

Understanding finally bloomed
within himself
as he planted the star-seed of trust
in a boy who would need it to grow 
in the well,
in the prison cell,
and bloom once again 
in a palace far beyond
Jacob’s wildest dreams.