When morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, “Get up, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or else you will be consumed in the punishment of the city.” But he lingered; so the men seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, the Lord being merciful to him, and they brought him out and left him outside the city. When they had brought them outside, they said, “Flee for your life; do not look back or stop anywhere in the Plain; flee to the hills, or else you will be consumed.” And Lot said to them, “Oh, no, my lords; your servant has found favor with you, and you have shown me great kindness in saving my life; but I cannot flee to the hills, for fear the disaster will overtake me and I die. Look, that city is near enough to flee to, and it is a little one. Let me escape there—is it not a little one?—and my life will be saved!” He said to him, “Very well, I grant you this favor too, and will not overthrow the city of which you have spoken. Hurry, escape there, for I can do nothing until you arrive there.” Therefore the city was called Zoar. The sun had risen on the earth when Lot came to Zoar.
Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven; and he overthrew those cities, and all the Plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. But Lot’s wife, behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.
We do not know her name
only her fate
Lot’s wife -
stopped in her tracks
forever
For all time
held up
as a warning
for those who look back.
Her husband
the one with a track record
the one who was prepared
to sacrifice his daughters
hesitated
He stalled
He negotiated
a place to hide
and his life was spared.
Who knows why
Lot’s wife looked back
In grief?
In compassion?
To ensure the safety
of her daughters
in the knowledge
that she couldn’t entrust that
to Lot?
Whatever the reason,
judgement
and execution
were swift
Just another unnamed woman
treated harshly
by a patriarchal culture.
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