Judith Delivers The Israelites Poem by Gert Strydom

(after Eugene Lee-hamilton)

Holofernes welcomed Judith in his tent
with in his eyes a kind of lustful gleam,
somewhat as if in a incoherent dream,
smiling, unarmored as if his power was spent.

Drunkenly he pushed her down and over her he bent,
a jewel on her scimitar had an ominous red gleam
as powerfully she beheaded him, made his blood stream,
heard his guards laugh in the tent adjacent

while she drew in her own breath
and in his heart there might have been a kind of love,
but away from the opening she did his body drag,
smiled after she had put him to death
and she believed her mission did come from above,
as she did put his head in a leather bag.

[References: Judith and Holofernes by Eugene Lee-hamilton. The apocryphal book of Judith.]