Poem: Bible stories 5/On The Plain: just a song of Gomorrah

click gomorrah to enlarge


Abram came to a place later known as Bethel
Where, as usual, he built an altar and prayed to the Lord
Lot, Abram's nephew was with him on the range

Abram's shepherds quarreled with Lot's shepherds
There was not enough grass for both their flocks
There was not room for them all in that place

Abram said to Lot: "Let there be no quarrel
Between you and me or your men and my men
We are like brothers to each other

You take the land on the right hand
And I will take the left or if you choose
The left hand, I will take the right."

Abram, was the older and could claim the first choice
And God had promised all the land to Abram
So he might have said to Lot "Go away, this is all mine"

But Abram showed a kind heart
And gave Lot his choice of the land
Lot looked over the land from the mountain

Where they were standing
And saw down in the valley the river Jordan
Flowing between the rich soil of the green fields

He saw Sodom and Gomorrah out on the plain
Near the mouth of the Jordan
Where it flows into Dead Sea

And Lot said "I will go down yonder to the plain"
He took his tents and his men and flocks of sheep and cattle
Leaving the land on the mountains to Uncle Abram

Lot may not have known that Sodom
Held the wickedest people in the land
But he went to live near them

And gradually moved his tent closer and closer
To Sodom until he was living in that wicked city
After Lot separated from Abram, God said to Abram:

"Lift up your eyes from this place, and look
East and west north and south
All the land that you can see

All the mountains and valleys and plains
I give to you and your children
And their children and those who come after them

Rise up, and walk through the land--it is all yours"
Abram moved his tent from Bethel and went to live
Near the city of Hebron in the south

Under an oak tree
Where he once again
Built an altar to the Lord.
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