My name is Gomer.
Faithless, scandalous, beyond
all hope of redemption, and yet…
Mine is a tale of steadfast love.
Not on my own part, surely,
but on that of the man
chosen by the Holy One to wed me.
From birth, I was tainted —
wild, restless, ensnared
early on by all that was forbidden.
A harlot by nature, my
eyes wandered from idol to idol, and I pledged
to serve no other god save that
of my own desires.
Having found fleeting satisfaction
in vaporous loves,
when my husband came for me,
his enduring mercy was not something
I could fathom.
Marriage to him could never be enough
to quench the deep well of my longings.
Or so I believed.
Our firstborn’s name was Jezreel, and
the second's meant "No Mercy,"
because I did not desire such, and I certainly
did not deserve it.
Did not apprehend its worth.
So I strayed into the arms
of those who did not
cherish me.
There came another child, “Not Loved,” and
another, “Not My People,”
whose names were chosen for the
spiteful purpose of needling
the faithful wretch
who would still take me back,
even now, foolish and kind,
eternally forgiving,
when all I craved was escape.
But at long last, the freedom I chased ended
in slavery, and I found myself bound in chains.
Stripped bare and shivering, forsaken
by those who claimed to love me,
my own value condensed
to a measly fifteen shekels of silver and a paltry
measure of barley.
I had no desire to look upon the
certain cruelty of my new master’s face.
My head bowed and my own face hidden
behind tangled, raggedy locks,
I waited further humiliation.
And yet…
Gentle hands unclasped my
bindings, taking care where
iron had chafed.
A warm covering was draped
about me, shrouding my nakedness,
banishing the cold.
“What shall I do with you, Gomer?”
Such a compassionate voice,
one which had once prompted derision,
but now provoked only
deepest shame.
My redeemer?
He was my own
faithful husband, whom I had
spurned times innumerable
and finally deserted altogether.
I had spared him no thought
in my unrelenting, unrepentant pursuits.
What he thought of me
I could only guess, and with the guessing
came despair.
“Wife.”
I flinched. I was filth and degradation,
the very least deserving of that name,
and he called me by it here?
Before these witnesses? In these surroundings?
Was he mad?
I opened my eyes and behold, the cloth now covering me
was my own discarded wedding garment,
forgotten these many years past,
still white and gleaming.
Incredulous, I glanced upward,
and was undone.
The light of a grace I had never known
poured from a humble gaze and bathed me in love
too unfathomable to perceive.
It was a persistent spring rain
that washed my soul clean and
watered the parched soil of my desert heart.
“Gomer, my own wife, how could I give you up?
You are no longer your own, you know.
I’ve redeemed you this day.
Would that you understood the depths of my love, dear one.
For you,” he whispered, careful hands rising to frame my sodden face,
as though, within its features, he glimpsed all he had longed for,
“I would gladly have paid everything.”
And turning, he enclosed me in the protective shelter of his arm,
and led me away
home.
“It has been an age since last you stood upon this
precipice, youngling,” the magister observed. “What brings you to my dragon haven
once more?”
