God saw Jacob’s ladder as a way
            back down and into the rock
from which he’d been released.

Babel could have been that way,
            but words had yet to be broken
and here was this kid, delicious,

wishing his way to him. Finally,
            a dreaming kid! Behold,
he thought, my ticket home.

And so, while the angels ballyhoo’d
            and Jacob fretted
about his seed, down he climbed

in plain sight,    
            and what with all the hoopla
Jacob never noticed

God step down and through his mind,
            into the ground
of his sleeping self—only a tug

from the wake of Him.