Psalm Project 2

So I have another Psalm inspired poem for us today. This one is fairly spooky and depressing. Sorry for that. Fortunately, the laments of the Psalms gives permission to be a bit melancholy and morose.

So recently I have read Psalms 3-6. I won't post my notes on them but I will add that they are two laments and a teaching. The teaching requires us to trust in an immediacy of God's actions despite the analysis of a current situation. I liked the sentiment, thought I'd share.

This poem is inspired from a line in Psalm 2. In that line the enemies of the Israelites view God as a chain, as something to be broken and be freed of. I thought this was an interesting idea and feel that a lot of my contemporary critics of Christianity would agree that my faith is an archaic set of outdated principles from a mysteriously vague book written 3500 years ago. I don't think the sentiment has changed in all that time when it comes to God and why people bother following him. I took this prompt and ran off in a surprising direction that caught even me off guard. If you are squeamish. Stop reading here.

Chain 

“Let us break their chains,” they say, “and throw off their fetters.”

-          Psalm 2:3

He laughs at my nervous joke

And spittle flies on the dashboard

Laughter turns to coughing

As he perfumes the car with garlic.

This is my chain, they will say.

He leaves the hotel room abruptly

The old bones holding his thinning skin

Are not strong like mine. He is tired.

A cigarette dances across his lips

Before he returns to my body.

I stay up till dawn chatting with my toilet.

He says we can’t fight nature. He knows best.

Between my legs I am human wastebasket.

Do not call me anointed. Do not speak of soft skin

Or blue eyes or youth found in fingertips.

The chain, they say, is a genetic destiny.

It crawls through my skin when I am lonely.

Lately, I am lonely less. I vomit often.

Despite the prayers burning away my veins

I am that shriveling cigarette on his lips.

My friends say their chain is a bride.

A woman with round hips,

White dress hugging her chest,

With the beach reflected in her hair.

They laugh and say mine will rent a tux.

Some lovers call me anointed, some; their son.

I am an heir to filth and soiled bed sheets.

Perched in the middle of this foreplay,

Beading down my forehead with sweat is a song.

My mother sang it when she flipped pancakes.

“Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,

Bind my wandering heart to thee.”