JEREMIAH CHAPTER 1 - 8

BOOK OF JEREMIAH

After the death of king Josiah came
The decline of divine favour in flame,
And two parties vied in the court of kings
For power political instead of wings
Of faith: the one trusted Egypt would rise
Again a bulwark thrust against the skies,
While others rightly saw that Babylon
Was the new power to rule under the sun.
And so they argued about whom to trust,
While prophets laid their honour in the dust
To seek all help from You, Beloved alone.
Jeremiah cries to the heart of stone,
Lifts up a voice lamenting that Your own
Should turn from You to politics and rust.

JEREMIAH 1

1 The words of Jeremiah son
Of Hilkiah, a priest when done
Of those who were in Anathoth
In land of Benjamin for growth,
2 To whom the word of YHWH came down
In days Josiah was in town,
The son of Amon, king of Judah,
In the thirteenth year of his reign.
3 It also came in the days of
Jehoiakim who was son of
Josiah king of Judah, to
The end of the eleventh year
Of Zedekiah the son too
Of Josiah, Judah’s king dear,
Up to the carrying away
Of Jerusalem in the sway
Of the fifth month captivity.
4 Then the word of YHWH came to me:
5 ”Before I formed you in belly
I knew you, and before you came
Out of the uterus your fame
I set apart, and I ordained
You prophet to nations arraigned.”
6 Then I said “Ah, Lord YHWH, see now,
I can’t speak, I’m a child in brow.”
7 And YHWH said to me, “Do not say
‘I am a child along the way,’
For you shall go to everyone
To whom I send you when you’re done,
And what I tell you, you will say.
8 “Do not be afraid of their faces,
For I’m with you to save your graces,”
Says YHWH. 9 And YHWH stretched out His hand
And touched my mouth. And YHWH’s command
To me was, “See, I’ve put my song
In your mouth, so you can’t go wrong.
10 “See, I have given you this charge
Today over nations at large
And over kingdoms, to root out
And to pull down, destroy the stout,
And to throw down and build and plant.”

I’ve been a child, and probably well known
To You as sovereign sitting on your throne.
But I have never felt Your hand on mouth
Nor heard Your speaking coming from the south.
That may be just because creating hand
Of You has never left my breath and sand,
But from the start to finish holds the form
In which I walk and talk by Your hand warm.
It may be that I do not hear Your voice
Because in every syllable rejoice
The winds, the grasses, plaints of bird and beast
That compass me around in royal feast.
Only the silence can make the word heard,
Only the letting go reveal hand stirred.

11 There was a word of YHWH to me,
Saying “Jeremiah, what see?”
And I said “Rod of almond tree.”
12 YHWH said to me, “You have seen well,
For I am watching My words’ spell
To carry it out hill and dell.”
13 YHWH’s word came to me once again,
Saying “What do you see and when?”
I said “I see a boiling pot
Opened toward the northland’s plot.”
14 And YHWH said to me, “From the north
An evil event shall break forth
On all the dwellers of the land.
15 ”For lo, I’ll call each family’s band
From all the northern kingdoms’ stand,”
Says YHWH, “and they shall come and they
Shall each one set his sway
Up in the entering of the gates
Of Jerusalem for estates,
And against its walls round about,
Against all Judah’s cities stout.
16 “And I will speak My judgements fair
Against them for their wickedness,
Who have forsaken My address,
And burned incense to idols there,
And worshipped what their own hands made.
17 “So tighten your belt and get up,
And speak to them though you’re a pup,
All I command, don’t be dismayed
At their faces, for I will not
Let you be afraid of their plot.
18 “And see, I’ve given you today
For a strong city and for stay
Of iron pillar, brazen walls
Against the whole land as it falls,
Against the kings of Judah too,
Against its princes come in view,
Against its priests, against the folk
Of the whole country at a stroke.
19 “And they shall fight against you and
They shall not prevail where you stand,
For I’m always with you,” says YHWH,
“To bring you to salvation’s view.”

You never gave me visions of the pot
And almond rod, I never heard the plot
Of Your voice telling me message unsought.
I have no mandate struck in gold or got
From Your hand and Your throne, but still I find
An empathy with Jeremiah’s kind.
I find myself to rant against the priest
As well as king and president at least,
And to be thrown out of both church and feast.
Without command I tighten belt and raise
A voice of judgement and a voice of praise,
One to the human prodigy and one
To You alone, Beloved, when I’ve begun.
Let me blast in jeremiad increased.

JEREMIAH 2

1 A word of YHWH was for me saying:
2 “Go shout at Jerusalem’s brow,
Say ‘So says YHWH to whom you’re praying,
I do remember you and how
Kind you were in your youth somehow,
The love of when you were engaged,
When you followed after Me paged
In the desert and in a land
That was not sown by human hand.
3 “Israel was holiness to YHWH,
The firstfruits of His increase too,
All who devour him shall offend,
And destruction shall be their end,”’”
Says YHWH. 4 So hear the words of YHWH,
O house of Jacob, and be true,
All the families of Israel’s house.
5 So says YHWH of His early spouse,
“What fault did your ancestors find
In Me that they went off the blind
To walk after vain idols share
And become vain themselves and bare?”
6 They did not say “Where now is YHWH
That brought us from Egypt’s land’s crew,
And led us through the wilderness,
Through a land of deserts and mess,
Through a land of drought and of shade
Of death, through a land no one made
A path and where none had address?”
7 “I brought you to a fruitful land
To eat its produce out of hand,
And you came to defile My land,
And made My heritage to stand
Abomination and a mess.
8 “The priests did not say 'Where is YHWH?’
And those who treat of process due
Did not know Me, the pastors too
Transgressed against me, prophets came
To prophesy in Baal’s name,
And act according to his shame.”

You were the portable in gods, that’s why
The people followed You upon the dry
And parched land of the road past Mount Sinai.
But even then they confused You with that
Sun-disk of Egypt between calf-horns sat.
So how can You expect them in the green
Of settlement not to turn the gods seen
Upon the Canaanite field’s fruitful sheen?
Beloved, the words of Jeremiah take
The legend of Your leading for the sake
Of Israel’s love to bolster up the view
That Josiah for politics made true.
The faith I bring to You is bare indeed:
I grasp in lust and monolatric greed.

9 “Why do I keep trying with you?”
Says YHWH, “and with your children too?
10 “Go look at Chittim’s isles and see,
Send to Kedar, diligently
Consider and know if there’s been
Anywhere else this kind of sin.
11 “Has any nation changed their gods,
And yet they’re not gods, merely clods?
But My folk has changed glory’s sight
For things without profit or right.
12 “So be amazed, you skies, at this,
And be afraid and flee from bliss,”
Says YHWH. “My folk have done two wrongs.
They have forsaken Me in songs,
The fountain of water of life,
And dug out cisterns, broken knife,
That hold no water in the strife.

Beloved, Your prophets always seem to like
To praise good Kedar with a message rife,
And notice that he never leaves his faith
In the one God alone for wicked wraith.
When Israel follows after politics
And chances any goddesses with tricks,
The tents of Kedar in their faithful way
Keep to the shining light of righteous day.
Beloved, let the skies above be amazed
That humble people are not driven crazed
By policy and facile innovation,
But keep plodding on without exultation.
The Chamberlins beside the homely hearth
Kept to the Psalms and Sabbath despite swarth.

14 Is Israel a servant here,
Is he a homeborn slave with gear?
Why is he spoiled, a prey to tear?
15 Against him roar young lions in rage,
And make his land a brigandage.
The children too of Noph, those bred
Of Tahapanes break your head.
17 Have you not brought this on yourself,
Forsaking YHWH your Ælohim,
When He led you across the stream?
18 Now what have you to do with elf
Of Egypt, to drink Sihor’s flood?
Or what have you to do with mud
Of the Assyrian to drink
The waters at the river brink?

The prophets try to place the blame of flood
Of foreign aggression upon the bud
Of trusting in the gods and goddesses
That blossom from the countries with a fizz.
The fact is factions that placed trust in each
Empire around Jerusalem to reach
Weakened the kingdom by partisan thought,
Failure to seek a higher road and taught.
The higher road was independence sought,
The national view of the state and church,
The wedding of You with the throne as perch.
The monotheistical ideal came
To bolster nationalist views and fame,
No stronger basis leaves me in the lurch.

19 ”Your own wickedness shall correct
Your wrong views, and what you select
In your apostasy shall make
Reproof upon you for My sake;
So know and see the bad and bitter,
That you’ve forsaken YHWH, you quitter,
Your Ælohim, and that My fear
Is not in you,” says Lord YHWH near.

It may not be quite accurate to say
That Israel kept once to the narrow way
In times of Moses, Joshua and Judges,
And only after Josiah now fudges.
Truth is the two ways were pointed out fast
By Moses, and Joshua too at last
Said choose you this day, and Elijah came
To Carmel with a holy light and flame.
The wrong does not teach right, but reinforces
The everlasting coming to divorces.
Beloved, the prophet grasps at claws when he
Reflects upon the past apostasy,
And hopes to ignite faith in the pretence
That faith was ever found in Israel’s tents.

20 ”From ancient time I broke your yoke,
And burst your chains, and then you spoke,
‘I’ll not transgress,’ when on each height
Of hill and under each green mite
Of tree you wandered in the night
Of harlotry instead of right.
21 “I’d planted you a noble vine,
Completely a right seed of Mine:
How did you turn into a wild
Plant of a strange vine and defiled?
22 “Though you wash with nitre and take
Plenty of soap, still your sins’ stake
Is marked before Me,” says Lord YHWH.

Attributing Your name to a false god,
To vain things under fertility’s pod,
Is what the commandment prohibits when
It says not to lift up Your name again.
Today as in the past the folk rise up
To say that they drink from communion cup
While worshipping the risen Baal like tup
With the pretext that calling false gods YHWH
Makes everything right in the divine view.
Beloved, baptism does not change the sin
A whit nor wash away uncomely din
Of pagan hymn and brawl beneath the star
Of Queen of heaven across from the bar.
Pollution’s not on hand but heart within.

23 How can you say “I’m not polluted,
I’ve not followed Baal convoluted?”
See your way in the valley, know
What you’ve done, you are not a slow
Dromedary in ways saluted.
24 A wild ass in the wilderness
That sniffs the wind in joyous dress,
In her time who can turn away?
All who seek her will not be tired,
But in her month they’ll find her fired.
25 Keep from walking barefoot, and keep
From being thirsty for a peep:
But you said “There’s no hope, for I
Have loved strange gods and I shall ply
To go after them by and by.”
26 As the thief is ashamed when he
Is found, so is the house in fee
Of Israel ashamed to be;
They with their kings, princes and priests
And their prophets come to make feasts,
27 Say to a block of wood “You are
My counsellor” and to a stone
“You have sired me” for on their own
That have turned their back on My throne
And not shown their face, but in time
Of trouble they will give a mime:
“Get up and save us from the groan.”
28 But where are your gods that you’ve made?
Let them get up and on parade
Save you in times of trouble laid,
As many as towns are your gods,
O Judah laid out on the sods.

The Protestant today protests that he
Does not follow Baalim in heathen spree,
And yet he holds fast that theology,
The human sacrifice, the waking god,
The rite of spring, the bud, the bloom, the pod.
The very same in spirituality
Comes ever and anon upon the tree:
When trouble comes, the heart comes back to beg
Your help, Beloved, as though the driven peg
Had never left Your bosom. Here I go,
Beloved, semper reformandi in show,
But let my life return into the glow
Of Your law, Your face, and Your sacred throne,
Where I shall worship You and You alone.

29 “Why will you come plead with Me now?
You’ve all transgressed against My brow,”
Says YHWH. 30 “In vain I strike your sons,
They’re not corrected on their buns,
Your own sword has your prophets slain,
Like a destroying lion’s mane.
31 “O generation, see YHWH’s word:
A desert have I been inured
To Israel? A land in dark?
Why do My people say a lark,
‘Rebelling we come not to You?’
32 “Can a girl forget jewellery’s due
Or a bride her bridal gown’s view?
Yet My folk have forgotten Me
Days without number, without fee.
33 “Why do you pretend you do right
To seek My love? That’s why the sight
Teaches the wicked walk in night.
34 “Also upon your skirts is found
The blood of innocent renowned:
It did not take a secret search
To find it fresh upon your smirch.
35 “Yet you say ‘I am innocent,
So surely His anger is spent.’
See, I will argue with you when
You say that you’ve not sinned again.
36 “Say! You’re vile to repeat your game,
Even in Egypt you find shame,
As you were of Assyrian fame.
37 “Indeed, you’ll go out from him too,
And your hands on your heads in view,
For YHWH has rejected your hopes,
And you’ll not prosper with such popes.”

Religious politics remain the same
After the centuries in the old game.
The leaders are both fickle and aware
Only of their own power to keep the stair.
So when they change their minds before the folk
They claim it’s this way that they always spoke.
Their ways have been consistent, out for broke,
And they speak truth: from start to finish they
Have only been out to gain their own sway.
So when it’s famous to toe to Your line
They pretend that’s what they have done in sign
From birth. And yet You fail to love their eyes
Who come to You in hypocritic guise.
Leave me, Beloved, my own heart to despise.

At the reception of the president
At the new year or at the evening spent
Remembering pretence of independent,
You see the frocks and gowns in pastel hue
Pass by in their parade of garish cue,
Look on the smirch of blood that stains the cloth
Of the elite flying to fire like moth.
At the mass when the priest comes into view
With skirts spread out and ironed and slick as new,
See the spots red and crimson on them spread,
Remember all the holocaustly dead,
The Jews, the Africans, Indians unfed.
Beloved, the days of state and business keep
The barge afloat, while I rage and I weep.

JEREMIAH 3

1 “They say ‘If a man divorce wife
And she goes out from the home strife
To marry other men, shall he
Return to her again in fee?
Does that not greatly pollute land?’
But you have played the harlot band
With many lovers, yet return
Again to Me and do not spurn,”
Says YHWH. 2 “Lift up your eyes unto
The high places where you in view
Have fornicated, find a place
Where you have not lain in disgrace.
You’ve sat beside the road to wait
For johns like desert Arabs mate,
And you’ve defiled the land by your
Fornicating and by the store
Of your wickedness. 3 “So the showers
Of rain have been withheld from bowers,
And there has been no latter rain;
But you had the daring face of
A whore, without shame called it love.
4 “Will you not from now on tell Me,
‘Dad, You’re my guide in youthful spree?’”
5 Does He keep it up for an age
And watch for ever on the stage?
See, these things you have spoken fast,
Doing evil, yet not outcast.

Pollution of the land is the result
Of idol worship caught in the sex cult.
I cannot make connexion quite but see
A glimmer of the golden bough lightly
In touch with Jeremiah in his spree.
But whether by contagious magic or
By sympathetic magician in store,
The fact is the pollution of the shore
Of every country in the world today
Suggests idolatry is in full sway.
Beloved, I turn from plastic wrapper to
The words on Sinai that were spoken true
And faithful to prevent excess and strew,
And find my faith and practice in Your pew.

I know a lot of Christians without shame
Who talk about love blaspheming Your name.
TV evangelists have the same fame
As Jeremiah’s friends who played the game.
To die on cross is just a euphemism
For the orgasmic whoreship of baptism.
And eating bread and drinking wine’s preamble
To eating menstruous pussy at a gambol.
I hate to use these words, Beloved, it’s not
My kind of language nor what I’ve been taught,
But Jeremiah’s teen-age mind in slot
Is showing under Your name’s approbation.
The language is no doubt the proper ration
Against enormity of Christian station.

6 YHWH also said to me in days
Of Josiah the king of praise,
“Have you seen the apostasy
That Israel has done from Me?
She has gone up every high hill
And there under every green tree
Has fornicated to her fill.
7 “I said after she’d done all these,
‘Return to Me.’ She would not please.
Her traitor sister Judah saw.
8 “And I saw and with ready claw
For all of Israel’s lack of law
Divorced her and sent her away,
Still traitor sister Judah gay
Did not take warning, went to play
The harlot too in the same way.
9 “It happened fornication vile
Of her actions came to defile
The land, and she wrought fornication
With stone and wooden dildo’s ration.
10 “And yet for all of this her traitor
Sister Judah was no abater,
Did not repent with her whole heart,
But in pretence of righteous part,”
Says YHWH. 11 And so said YHWH to me,
“The open sin of Israel’s spree
Is better than the treachery
Of Judah in hypocrite’s cart.

Israel’s open, idol-worshiping farce
Continues in the Christian verb to parse
In human sacrifice and professed love.
Judah’s ancient dagger hidden in glove
Continues in the mosque and synashove.
One incurs wrath, the other goes astray,
And the oppressed by-stander lives to pay.
Three-headed god that Christians worship still
May not be stone or wooden dildo’s pill,
But lives in the iconic video,
And in the plastic vibrators that glow
With jazz before the cross and altar show.
Beloved, I turn to You alone and hear
Commandments spoken singular with fear.

12 “Go and proclaim these words toward
The north,” says YHWH the Lord,
“‘Return, backsliding Israel,
It was not that My anger fell
On you for your destruction, I
Am merciful,’ says YHWH, ‘And I
Will not remain angry for aye.’
13 “Only admit your sinfulness,
That in your doing you transgress
Against YHWH your God, and have scattered
Your charms to strange idols and battered
Beneath each green tree, and have not
Obeyed My voice as you’ve been taught,”
Says YHWH. 14 “Return, backsliding folk,”
Says YHWH, “for I’m married to you.
I will take you and not revoke,
One from a city and two from
A family, and you shall come
Into the fortress. 15 “And I’ll give
You shepherds by My own heart’s sieve,
Who’ll feed you with knowledge and true
Understanding of what to do.
16 “Then it shall come to pass, when you
Are multiplied, increased in land
In those days and by My command,”
Says YHWH, “that they will say no more,
‘Ark of the covenant of YHWH.’
It shall not come to their mind, nor
Shall they remember it, nor do
Their visits to it anymore.

The church claims to be that refuge You give
To Gentiles and to Jews who come to live
Under the grace of Your forgiving sieve.
The principle of functional replacement
Of heathen practices is its abasement.
The church of Constantine accommodated
To cultic sacrifice and unabated
Idolatry with such replacements’ view.
The same is fostered by missionised crew
In every place, and so we eat the brew
Of wine and bread instead of children’s flesh
And use a crucifix for dildos fresh,
Unless we’re Protestant, and then we take
Imagined cross, masturbatory cake.

17 “At that time Jerusalem shall
Be called the Throne of YHWH, and all
The nations shall be gathered to
Jerusalem, and name of YHWH.
No more shall they follow dictates
Of their evil hearts. 18 “In those states
And days the house of Judah shall
Walk with the house of Israel,
And they shall come together out
Of the land of the north with shout
To the land that I’ve given as an
Inheritance to partisan.
19 “But I said ‘How can I put you
Among the children and their due,
Bestowing on you the land of
Muhammad, heritage of love,
Beauty of the hosts of the nations?’
“And I said ‘You shall in elations
Call Me, “My Father,” and not turn
Away from Me, nor My love spurn.’

When You, Beloved, brought back from their exile
Israelite folk who had been gone a while,
Brought them from Babylon and from the plains
Of east and north once more to count their gains,
You sorrowed to think they might touch the land,
Muhammad’s heritage by Your command.
The fortress of Jerusalem You find
Is at the west end far from temple lined.
Let that be for Judah’s trifled descendants.
Let them take comfort in David’s new pendants.
But let Your Throne, Beloved, stand bright and bare
For all nations beneath Muhammad’s care.
And let the bride look from her peaceful tower
Toward the golden spires at the prayer hour.

20 “Indeed like a wife gone astray
From her husband has been your way
Of dealing treacherously here
With Me, O house of Israel near,”
Says YHWH. 21 A voice was heard upon
The high places, weeping at dawn
And supplications of the spawn
Of Israel; for they’ve perverted
Their way, forgotten YHWH concerted,
Their Ælohim. 22 Repent, backsliding
Children, and I will heal confiding.
See, we return to You, for You
Are our Ælohim, You are YHWH.
23 Indeed it’s vain to look to hills,
The mountains crowding with their stills;
Truth is in YHWH our Ælohim
Is Israel’s salvation in stream.
24 Idol of shame’s consumed the work
Of our ancestors from the quirk
Of our youth, their flocks and their herds,
Their sons and daughters burnt like turds.
25 We lie down in our shame with face
Covered, for we have sinned apace
Against YHWH our Ælohim’s grace,
We and our ancestors in place,
From our youth to this very day,
And we have not come to obey
YHWH our Ælohim’s voice in sway.

If those upon the altars would just stop
To see how heathen are the prayers they pop,
And then repent of human sacrifice,
The offering of sons of gods for nice
Warm feelings in the church and money gained
From oil and gas and corn once it’s ungrained,
Then the last prayer that Jeremiah makes
Here would apply to them and for their sakes.
Beloved, I hie me from the worship’s din,
And from the market-place, the den of sin,
And come to the abandoned high place where
You speak to the whole earth in witness’ share
To each soul singly, head and shoulders bare.
I find both fear and solace lurking there.

JEREMIAH 4

1 “If you’ll return, O Israel,”
Says YHWH, “Return to Me a spell,
And if you’ll put away your sad
Abominations from My sight,
Then you’ll not be removed from right.
2 “And you shall swear: 'As YHWH does live,
In truth, in judgement righteous sieve,'
And the nations shall bless themselves
In Him and in His glory’s shelves.”

Beloved, if You were in such need of love,
Why did you make the human heart with glove,
The eye blind to the truth, the ear so small
That it hears not the scratching on the wall?
If You, Beloved, desired return to You,
Why did You make a heart that takes its cue
Always from empty stars and fleeing sun?
Why did You sow creation with the dun?
I turn to You for fleeting moments sent
Upon the night of fragrance in my tent
And then enfold again upon the grief
Of longing beyond hope, beyond belief.
Be satisfied with Your eternity,
Moments of Your reprieve, Your priceless sea.

3 For so says YHWH to Judah’s men
And to Jerusalem again,
“Break up your fallow ground and sow
Not among thorns to make a show.
4 “Circumcise yourselves now to YHWH
And take away the foreskins’ shoe
From your heart, You men of Judah
And dwellers of Jerusalem,
Lest My fury come tooth and claw
Like fire, and burn as to condemn
With none to quench, because of woe
Of your wicked doings in show.”

The churchly crew thinks Paul invented runs
Of circumcision on the heartly buns,
But You and I, Beloved, know that the pen
Of Jeremiah quoted Moses when
He called for circumcision of the heart.
Perhaps it’s true You whispered of that art
Both noble and remarkable when You
Bent across Sinai’s ragged storming view.
It is not realistic, Beloved, here
To demand of men on earth to appear
To break the ground since it was cursed with fear.
You ask too much, Beloved, when You expect
A man to put the knife to the select,
When the raw flesh quivers where it is wrecked.

5 Declare you in Judah, declare
Within Jerusalem, and share:
“Blow now the trumpet in the land;
Cry, gather together to stand
And say ‘Assemble in a crowd,
And let’s go in the fortress proud.’
6 ”Lift up a flag in Zion’s way,
Strengthen yourselves, don’t stand and stay,
For evil I bring from the north,
And great destruction coming forth.”
7 Gone up has a lion from his den,
Destroyer of nations again,
He’s come from his place to make land
A desolation, and the band
Of your cities a waste without
Inhabitant to range about.
8 For this tie on sackcloth and weep
And howl, for the fierce anger steep
Of YHWH’s not turned back from our sleep.
9 “And it shall come to pass that day,”
Says YHWH, “the heart of king in sway
Shall perish and the heart of prince;
And the priest astonished shall wince,
And prophets wonder at the way.”

I do not fathom, my Beloved, the deep
Aloneness of Your heart in anger’s keep.
I’ve never suffered such wrath as You do,
My anger’s just a ripple on the dew,
And then the calm stopped by the buttercup,
The chickweed blossom, dandelion turned up.
I cannot empathize with the great wrath
That turns the flaming suns out from their path.
The human heart must perish at the thought
Of what You know, or pretend when uncaught
That You are all love, sweet like Ashtoreth
Come on the groves at eventide with breath
Of kind forgiveness, solace and the meet
And hopeful understanding of the street.

10 Then said I, “Ah, Lord YHWH! surely
You have deceived, deceived greatly
This people and Jerusalem,
Saying ‘You will have peace in hem’
Whereas the sword pricks to soul’s gem.”
11 At that time shall it be said to
This folk and Jerusalem’s crew,
“A dry wind from high places’ view
And in the wilderness toward
The daughter of My folk adored,
Not to fan nor to purify.”
12 A full wind from these comes for Me,
Now also I speak judgements free.
13 See, he shall come up as the clouds,
And his chariots as whirlwind shrouds:
His horses faster than the wings
Of eagles. Woe to us! Our springs
Are spoiled beneath a shredded sky.
14 Purify evil from your heart,
Jerusalem, so that the part
Of saving may come to your cart.
How long shall your vain thoughts remain
Within you to become a stain?
15 A voice declares the thing from Dan,
Publishes affliction in ban
From Mount Ephraim. 16 And so declare
To the nations, and show the share
Against Jerusalem, now come
Besiegers from a far land’s drum,
Raise their voice against Judah’s towns.
17 “As keepers of a field and downs
Are they against her round about;
Because she’s raised rebellious shout
Against me,” says YHWH without doubt.
18 “Your ways and doings have procured
These things to you, and have ensured
Your wickednesses, because they
Are bitter, because they hold sway
Into your heart to keep their way.”

You do not know what sword sweeps human heart
With the impounded dying of Your start,
The pretence of Your peace, the lowly bud
Of prophet raging unheard by the flood
Of sand and wind that blow across the rift
Of the Arabian desert of the miffed.
You do not know, Beloved, because You’re not
A man encumbered with both time and thought.
You see the ecstasies before the plot,
And know the calm before the age can drift.
Yet right You are, Beloved, when You condemn
The hand that crushes life’s untimely gem,
The fragile waiting of a bloom unknown
Even among the tombs of flesh and bone.

19 My aching guts, my aching guts!
I’m pained to my very heart’s struts,
My heart cries out within me; I
Cannot be still, since you my soul
Have heard the sound of trumpet roll,
And warning sound of war awry.
20 Destruction on disaster cried;
The whole land is spoiled in the tide,
And suddenly my tents are rent,
My curtains in a moment spent.
21 How long shall I still see the flag
And hear sound of the trumpet rag?
22 My folk is foolish, they’ve not known
Me, they are sottish children grown,
They have no thought to understand.
They are wise to do wickedness,
But to do good they’ve no address.
23 I looked upon the earth and see
It was without form and voidly
Under the skies without light’s hand.
24 I saw the mountains, how they shook,
And all the hills moved like a brook.
25 I saw, and see, there was no man,
And all the birds in heaven’s span
Had fled away beneath the look.
26 I stared, and see, the fruitful place
Was just a desert way to trace,
And all towns there were broken down
At the presence of YHWH, the frown
Of His fierce wrath shown without grace.
27 For so said YHWH: “All the land knew
A desolation, but end’s view
I have not made upon the place.
28 “For this the earth shall mourn, the skies
Above be black, because My sighs
Have sounded it, I have decided,
And will not change My mind unguided,
Neither will I turn it backwise.
29 “The whole town shall flee for the noise
Of horsemen and bowmen in poise,
They’ll go into the thickets and
Climb up the rocks, all towns shall stand
Forsaken, with no dweller’s guise.
30 “And when you’re spoiled, what will you do?
Though you clothe yourself with red hue,
Though you deck you with golden strew,
And paint your eyes with stibic stone,
You’ll dress yourself in vain and groan
That lovers despise you and seek
Your life the moment you are weak.
31 “I’ve heard a voice as of a girl
In labour, and the anguish whirl
As of one that brings forth her first
Child, the voice of the daughter cursed
Of Zion who bewails herself,
And spreads her hands: ‘Woe is my pelf,
My soul’s tired of murders’ outburst.’”

The whole town flees indeed, and every town
That lives beneath the glitter of the crown
Of painted faces. I have seen the drop
Of honey on the lip. I came to stop.
Beloved, the spoils are rampant on the grooved,
And every human way slinks out behoved.
The whole town flees, yet every spoil is spent
On the hopes that the human waiting lent.
Hear now the voice of labour, hear and know
The faint diminishing of human show,
The spreading of the hands, the piercing wail
That meets the dawn as a remembered tale,
Forgotten in eternal sweep of stars,
Erased from memory, leaving no scars.

JEREMIAH 5

1 ”Run back and forth and through the streets
Of Jerusalem, see retreats
And know and seek the squares in it,
If you can find a man that’s fit
To do judgement and seek the truth,
And I’ll forgive the town with ruth.”

One righteous man alive on earth’s enough
To keep Your mercy from spoiling the tough.
Beloved, I seek with Mr D.’s great light,
A lantern lit in Greece both day and night,
To find one righteous man on earth today.
I do not find one but has eyes on prey.
Admittedly, my sampling is so small
And limited, there may be better call.
There were one time in Israel in stall,
Unknown to king and prophet, thousands left
Who kept Your law and left earth unbereft.
If I can just find that one righteous man,
I’ll slit his throat and leave the world to scan
Your judgement long due by eternal plan.

2 And though they say ”YHWH lives above,”
They swear falsely with hand in glove.
3 O YHWH, are your eyes not on truth?
You’ve stricken them, but they’ve not grieved,
You have consumed them, they’ve received
None of correction; they have made
Their faces harder than the stayed
Rock; they have refused to return.

The lovely world, the world where daffodils
Still call the poet to the lakes and hills,
Has felt the lash of plague and war and grief,
And yet turns not to Your only relief:
Awareness that there is no I but You,
And all humankind is of one boat’s crew.
Does that not tell You, my Beloved, the truth
That I have declared to You from my youth?
The noble in the human heart is won
Not by the suffering in the world that’s done,
But by the stopping in silence for fun,
To see the beauty of Your hand and find
The bread of life beyond the drunken dined.
Correction is not taken by the blind.

4 That’s why I said, “Indeed these earn
Nothing in poverty, they’re fools,
For they know not YHWH’s way in schools,
Nor judgement of their Ælohim.
5 “I’d go and ask the great men who
Have known the very way of YHWH,
And judgement of their Ælohim;
But these have altogether smashed
The yoke and burst the bonds and crashed.
6 “That’s why a lion from the woods
Will kill them and a wolf of hoods
Shall spoil them and a leopard too
Shall spy upon their cities’ view,
And every one that goes out then
Shall be torn into pieces when
Their sins are many and increased
Are their apostasies released.”

The yoke, the easy yoke that Jesus spread,
The yoke of Decalogue to the new-fed,
Is smashed by those who preach the Trinity,
And have faith in the sacrifice in spree
Of human lives on crosses for the dead.
The yoke, the easy yoke of spring and dress
Of life that sprouts without the heathen guess
Of gods and goddesses new-slain to rise
In fables underneath the brazen skies,
The yoke lies shattered in a splintered mess.
It was not vain that Moses dropped the stone,
It was not vain You slew the golden throne
Of calf and dancers, that You make us drink
Today the grit of profit from the sink.

7 “How shall I pardon you for this?
Your children just give Me the miss,
And swear by those that are no gods,
When I had fed them on full pods;
They committed adultery,
Gathered themselves in bands to be
In harlots’ houses on a spree.
8 “They were as fed horses at dawn,
Every one neighed after the lawn
Of his neighbour’s wife drawn upon.
9 “For these things shall I not lay charge?”
So says YHWH. “And shall not My soul
Take My revenge on such patrol?”

The falsehood posited by Christian ways
Results in the adulterer for praise.
Not only is the Trinity dressed up
But pagan god and goddess of the tup,
But the unfaithfulness to You to stay
In idol shadow and in idol sway
Relentlessly drives to the fash and gush
Of love and lust, of liquor on the lush,
Fulfilment of the juicy neighbour’s lay.
Beloved, take no vengeance on what is cue,
Inevitable as the falling dew,
And natural as the rising of the sun
Upon the stained beds that at dusk were won.
Forgive once more a world once gone askew.

10 “Go up on her walls and destroy,
But do not make a full employ;
Take away her ramparts, for they
Are not raised up as in YHWH’s way.
11 “For Israel’s house and Judah’s house
Have dealt Me like a traitor’s mouse,”
Says YHWH. 12 And they have belied YHWH
And said “He has not come in view,
Nothing will happen to our crew,
We’ll see no sword nor famine due.
13 “And the prophets shall become wind
Without a message in them binned,
And so it shall be done to them.”
14 So says YHWH Ælohim of hem,
“Because you speak this word, behold,
I’ll make My words no longer cold
In your mouth, but devouring fire
To this wooden people of ire.
15 “See, I’ll bring a nation on you
From far away, O Israel’s crew,”
Says YHWH, “it is a mighty band,
And ancient folk, you understand
Not one word of their tongue to know
What they mean when they speak and show.
16 “Their quiver is an open grave,
They are all mighty men and brave.
17 “They’ll eat up your harvest and bread,
Your sons’ and daughters’ share instead,
They’ll eat up your flocks and your herds,
They’ll eat up your vines and like birds
Your fig trees, they shall make you poor
In every walled city and sure
With the sword raised. 18 “Yet in those days,”
Says YHWH, “I will not of your praise
Make a full end. 19 “And it shall come
To pass, when you shall say in sum,
‘Why does YHWH our Ælohim do
All these things to us as undue?’
Then you shall give them answer true,
Just as you have forsaken Me
And served strange gods on land and sea,
So shall you serve strangers and stand
In a place that is not your land.”

The principle is simple and is just,
Beloved, if it tastes of both blood and dust:
To worship a god implies in the end
Worship of that god’s maker and his friend.
The worship of the foreign gods that felt
So good and right to Israel hid a welt:
Their masters would appear one day to bind
All those who worshipped both the seed and rind.
Beloved, the many gods around I see
Have hidden masters behind the bank’s fee,
Behind the president, behind the church,
And all of these would leave me in the lurch.
I eat the pod and drink the water free
From my own well, and pray to Your degree.

20 “Declare this in Jacob’s house and
Publish it in Judah to stand,
Saying 21 “‘Hear this now, foolish folk
And without a heart under yoke,
Eyes they may have, but do not see,
And ears, but hear not steadily.’
22 “Do you not fear me now?” says YHWH,
“Will you not tremble at My view,
Who have placed the sand for the bound
Of the sea by eternal ground,
That it cannot pass over it;
And though its waves may rush and rise,
Yet they cannot prevail in guise,
And though they roar beneath the skies,
They cannot pass over it fit.
23 “But this folk has revolt to share
Rebellion in their heart for care,
And they have turned aside, gone back.”
24 Neither do they say in heart’s slack,
Let us now fear YHWH Ælohim,
Who gives the rain both early scheme
And latter in its season’s beam;
He keeps for us appointed weeks
Of the harvest for which He seeks.

The rain-dance is a faith I cannot flout,
Being that it is an ancestral clout.
But Baal and Science tell us true enough
That sun evaporates the moisture’s cuff
And lets it fall at last from cloud on land
And sea as far as I can understand.
The prophet claims that You send down the rain
In love or in unconscious counter-stain.
I’ll grant that superstitious view, if You
Will show the world that Baal is not true
To demand sacrifice of humankind,
The stroke of war, the execution blind
Of felon caught red- or black-handed where
The bribes and taxes failed to show their share.

25 “Your sins have turned away these things,
And your bad deeds withhold the springs
Of good from you and your offsprings.
26 “Among My folk are wicked men
Who lie in ambush and set snares,
They set a trap, catch unawares.
27 “As a cage is full of birds, so
Their houses are full of lies’ show;
Therefore they have become so great
And got rich in both house and gate.
28 “They’ve got so fat they even shine,
Indeed they go beyond the fine
Deeds of the wicked on the vine;
They do not grudge the cause to rise
From the fatherless, in their guise
They prosper, but the needy’s right
They do not keep in justice’ sight.
29 “For these things shall I not inspect,”
Says YHWH, “a nation so select,
Does not My soul avenge itself?
30 “A wonder and horror on shelf
Is done in the land; 31 “Prophets speak
Falsely, and the priests keep their cheek
By means of that, and yet my folk
Love it, so what’s the end in stroke?”

The northern kingdom was of greater wealth,
I know not whether because nature’s stealth
Was in the plot: a greener land at least
For humankind as well as fowl and beast.
The wealth of Protestant, more northern show,
Is parallel upon the surface glow,
And may or may not mean that fatal ruse
Of church invisible had better shoes.
Beloved, hereby I shall forsake the views
Of Protestant and Catholic in pews,
And even the beloved in Orthodox
That stand or bow upon the church floor’s rocks.
I’ve neither wealth nor faith, nor god nor row
Of penance, but I set false prophets low.

JEREMIAH 6

1 ‘O children of Benjamin, come,
In a band flee Jerusalem,
Sound warning trumpet in Tekoa,
Set up a signal fire to gleam
In the town of Beth-Haccerem,
For evil’s from the north to show her,
A great destruction and a scream.
2 “The beautiful and delicate
I’ve cut off from the fortress gate.
3 “The shepherds with their flocks shall come
To her, they’ll pitch their tents in sum
Against her all around, they eat
Each in his own place his own treat.”

I do not know when Benjamin fled or
If it was in obedience to this roar
Of Jeremiah bellowing above
The sound of Bashan’s cows in heat or love.
But I know that as far as India
There has been found a breed that claims the law
Of Benjamin and speaks the grand shema’,
Despite the Hindoo cast that tints them more.
Beloved, I have no known ancestor here
That was at Sinai’s root to lend an ear
To Your voice, but if You again appear,
I promise to come and adore Your choice,
Or if I am too old to walk or fly,
I’ll send a grandson to hear You say why.

4 Prepare now war against her, rise,
And let’s go up under the skies
Of noon. Woe to us! For the day
Moves relentlessly on its way,
The shadows of the evening play.
5 Rise, and let us go out by night,
Let us destroy her palace site.
6 For so says YHWH of hosts, “Cut down
The trees and throw a mound in crown
Against Jerusalem, the town
To be attacked, she’s nothing but
Oppression inside the gate shut.
7 “As a spring pours out waters, so
She spews out wickedness to show,
And violence and spoil to know,
Before My eyes is grief and sores
Continually in and outdoors.
8 “Be taught now, O Jerusalem,
Lest My soul depart from your hem,
Lest I make you be desolate,
Land where no one lives in the gate.”

Plenty of people live within the gate
That opens to the narrow streets and late
Into the sacred temple square to find
Two mosques open to prayer for the well-dined.
Either You went back on Your threat at last,
Or else the folk that live there in the blast
Have been taught by Your word to keep the faith
In You and not follow after a wraith.
In truth, I find Armenian and more,
The Ethiopian there keeping score,
And every form of Christ-like on the shore,
As well as Jew and Muslim without gore.
Perhaps all of these have been tried and true,
And only I alone march out of view.

9 So says YHWH of hosts, “They shall glean
With care what’s left of Israel’s scene
As from a vine; turn back your hand
Like a grape-picker on the sand
Back to the baskets.” 10 To whom do
I speak and bear the witness true
And find them listening to the due?
See, their ear is uncircumcised,
And they cannot hear the advised,
See, YHWH’s message to them’s reproach,
They have no gladness in the broach.
11 That’s why I am full of YHWH’s wrath,
I’m tired of holding to the path,
I’ll pour it out on all the sons
Scattered upon the earth in tons,
And on the bands of youth in turn,
For even lord and wife shall burn,
The aged full of days’ concern.
12 “Their houses shall be given to
Others, both fields and wives in view,
For I will stretch out My hand to
The land’s inhabitants,” says YHWH.
13 “From least to greatest of them all
Are sunk in covetousness’ thrall,
And from the prophet to the priest
All are in their falsehood increased.
14 “They’ve also touched My people’s hurt
Without serious concern to blurt
’Peace, peace’, when there’s no Islam’s peace.
15 “Were they ashamed in their release
To abominations’ increase?
They were not ashamed, not at all,
They did not blush, that’s why they’ll fall
Among the rest who fall in gall;
At the time I shall come to them
To cast them down by stratagem,”
Says YHWH. 16 So says YHWH, “Stand beside
The streets and see and ask hawk-eyed
For the old ways, the good and tried
To walk in them, and so to find
Rest to your souls. But they replied
‘We’ll not walk in any such kind.’
17 “I’ve raised up for you watchmen too,
Hear the sound of the trumpet’s cue.
They say ‘We’ll not listen to you.’”

The circumcision of the ear was noted
In Torah too, for the people promoted.
While Jeremiah knows the knife is near,
He does not mean to cut a notch in ear.
He’s speaking of the fact that some folk hear
And others do not, when You speak out clear.
It seems that speaking on Sinai a rate
Is not enough to set the world out straight.
It takes the hearing as well as the speech,
It takes the doing what I heard You preach.
Beloved, I join in Jeremiah’s screech
And tell the denizens that would impeach
My heart to fail not when it comes to reach
Out and do what You order on my pate.

18 “So hear, you nations, come to know,
Assembly, what’s found in their show.
19 “Hear, earth, and see what evil I
Shall bring upon this folk to die,
The fulfilment of their own thoughts,
Because they’ve not obeyed My plots,
But rejected My law for slots.
20 “What use to bring Me incense from
Sheba, from far sweet cane in gum?”
21 That’s why YHWH says “See now, I lay
Such stumbling blocks before the way
Of this folk, and fathers and sons
Together shall fall to their stuns,
The neighbour and his friend I’ll slay.”
22 So says YHWH, “See, a people comes
From the north country and the bums
Of a great nation shall be raised
From the earth’s farthest edges crazed.
23 “They shall lay hold on bow and spear;
They’re cruel and have no mercy here;
Their voice roars like the sea, and they
Ride on their horses, in array
As men for war against your stay,
Daughter of Zion’s fortress in sway.”
24 We have heard of their fame: our hands
Turn weak, and anguish holds in bands,
And pain as a woman in labour.
25 Do not go to the field with sabre,
Nor walk outside, for the foe’s sword
And fear’s on every side restored.
26 O daughter of my folk, put on
Sackcloth, roll in ashes at dawn,
Mourn as for your only son in
Most bitter lamentation’s din;
For spoilers shall come suddenly
Upon us all before we see.
27 “I’ve set you for a tower and fort
Among My people, so you’ll court
Their knowledge and try their way’s sport.”
28 All of them turn aside to be
Walking in vain apostasy,
Slander of brass and iron. They’re all
Corrupters of the house and stall.
29 The bellows have been burnt, by fire
Has the lead been consumed, the hire
Of the founder is spent in vain,
Because their wicked deeds remain.
Silver rejected, they’ve been called,
YHWH’s kicked them out of field and stalled.

The sacrifice and incense on the altar
Is sweet to priest and to the one to falter
At keeping of Your law, Beloved, on sale
At Sinai to the humble and the hale.
The error of the past was in the vice
Of thinking sacrifice would make things nice,
Relieve of such responsibility
Of doing what You say and faithfully.
That error smells so sweet that men today
Join with their wenches in the awful sway
Of sacrifice and incense and the mood
Of music to release it from the crude
Of ancient pagan gore. What matters still
Is that we need not listen on the hill.

JEREMIAH 7

1 The word that came to Jeremiah
From YHWH, saying as by a crier,
2 “Stand in the gate of YHWH’s house and
Publish this word there by command,
‘Hear the message of YHWH, all you
Of Judah who come in these gates
To prostrate before YHWH’s estates.’”
3 So says YHWH of hosts, Israel’s God,
“Make straight your ways upon the sod,
And your actions and I will make
You live in this place, no mistake.
4 “Don’t trust in lying words that say
‘The temple of YHWH in the way,
The temple of YHWH, YHWH’s house here.’
5 “For if you completely repent
Of your ways and your actions meant,
And if you with a whole heart stay
To work out judgement in the way
Between a man and neighbour’s stay,
6 “If you do not oppress the stranger,
The fatherless, and widow ranger,
And do not shed blood innocent
In this place, or walk after tent
Of other gods to your own hurt,
7 “Then I will make you live alert
In this place, in the land that I
Gave your ancestors and for aye.
8 “Indeed, you trust in lying words
That profit nothing else but turds.
9 “Will you steal, murder, and commit
Adultery, swear falsely hit,
Burn incense to Baal, and go after
Other gods unknown by their laughter,
10 “And then come and stand before Me
In this house that is called to be
By My name, and say, ‘We are saved
While doing all these sins engraved’?

An early expression of gospel true
Is found in this passage of prophet crew:
Shed blood of innocent within the view
Of Zion’s temple, then go out and sin
With every lie and murder in the bin,
Then come to church and say with piety,
The blood shed cleanses me on Calvary.
Beloved, let me not trust in lying words
That are so spoken for the thrill of birds
That bask in station of preacher and priest.
Make of me rather one among the least,
Who follow Your commands, and when I fail,
Repent and accept grace instead of tale
That Christ has joined his blood to blood of Baal.

11 “Has this house called by My name now
Turned into a thieves’ den and mow
Before your eyes? See, even I,
I have seen it,” says YHWH in cry.
12 “But go now to My place in Shiloh,
Where I set My name in first silo,
And see what I did to it for
My people Israel’s wicked score.
13 “And now, because you have done all
These actions," says YHWH to appal,
“And I spoke to you, getting up
Early and speaking like a tup,
But you did not hear, I called you,
But you did not answer from pew,
14 “Therefore I will do to the house
Which is called by My name for dowse,
In which you trust, and to this place
Which I gave to you and for grace
To your ancestors, as I did
To Shiloh long since when it slid.
15 “And I will turn you from My sight,
As I have turned out every wight
Of your kinfolk, posterity
Of all Ephraim’s community.
16 “And so do not pray for this folk,
Lift up cry, supplicate for bloke,
Make intercession here to Me,
For I’ll not listen to your plea.

What a relief, Beloved, that I’m not set
To pray for my foes and the Christian met
To eat the human sacrifice in tale
Atoning for improper use of mail!
I thought Your fair Messiah chose to say
That prayer for enemies was on the way,
But that cannot be true, since here the prophet
Commands me not to pray for those who scoff at
Your golden law. Beloved, I meet the claw
With lips tight shut. I only pray in maw
Of David’s words, and some of those are curses
On enemies with silk and leather purses.
What a relief, Beloved, that I need not
Invent my own prayers outright on the spot!

17 “Don’t you see what they do in towns
Of Judah, in the streets and downs
Of old Jerusalem? 18 “The kids
Gather wood, the fathers’ bids
Kindle the fire, and women knead
The dough to make cakes for the greed
Of the queen of heaven; and pour
Out drink offerings to false gods score
To move Me to My anger’s door.
19 “Do they make Me angry?” says YHWH.
“Themselves they shame in their own view.”
20 Therefore says the Lord YHWH, “Indeed,
My anger and My fury speed
Out on this place, on man and beast,
On the trees of the field increased,
On the fruit of the ground. And it
Will burn and not be quenched in fit.”

The Jesus biscuit lies upon the tongue
Of every kneeling fool both old and young,
And tastes, no doubt, as bland is any flesh
Prepared without the blood and spices fresh.
The blood is separated in a dish
The priest may guzzle like a flaming fish,
Which leaves the cookies for the Queen of heaven
To lie alone with or without the leaven.
The ancient faith is documented here,
It goes back further than it would appear
By lessons of church fathers come to steer.
The ancient faith in sacrifice to gods
And goddesses, queen mothers with their prods
Is still worn by the faithless on the sods.

21 So says YHWH of hosts, Israel’s God,
“Add your burnt offerings to the pod
Of sacrifices and eat meat.
22 “I did not speak to your ancestors,
Commanding them in day’s retreat
That I brought them from the sequesters
Of Egypt’s land that they should burn
Offerings and sacrifices earn.
23 “But this is what I told them, saying
‘Obey My voice and keep from straying,
And I will be your God and you
Will be My people. So be true
In all the ways that I’ve told you,
And so it may be well with you.’
24 “Yet they did not obey or lend
An ear, but followed on the spend
In the advice and the dictates
Of their own wicked hearts estates,
And went back and not through the gates.
25 “Since the day that your ancestors
Came out of land of Egypt’s doors
Up to this very day, I’ve sent
To you all My servants that went
As prophets, I rose early and
Send them all out upon the land.
26 “Still they did not obey Me or
Incline their ear, but stiffened score
Of their neck. They did worse than what
Their ancestors did in the rut.
27 “Therefore you shall speak all these words
To them, but they’ll not leave their curds
To obey you. You’ll also call
Them, but they’ll not answer at all.
28 “So you shall say to them, ‘Now this
Is a nation that does dismiss
The voice of YHWH their Ælohim
Nor take correction on the beam.
Truth has perished and it has been
Cut off from their mouth in between.’

The people when they came from Egypt in
The land of Canaan to raise up a din,
Were not called there by You, Beloved, to win
The day by offering and sacrifice bin.
They were called out to obey You and be
Your people and make You their God only.
And yet they erred in bringing sacrifice,
As though such things could turn sin sweet and nice.
The African may bring honey and mice,
The Semite of a late day camel skin,
But You, Beloved, require the frequent sound
Of doing right upon the bloody ground.
You struck down Israel in ancient time
For being too Christian, which was a crime.

29 “Cut off your hair and throw it out,
And make a lamentation’s shout
On empty hilltops, for YHWH’s left
Forsaken generations deft.
30 “For Judah’s folk do wickedness
In My sight,” says YHWH. “They would bless
Abominations in the house
Called by My name, in evil dowse.
31 “And they have built high places in
Tophet, the Vale of Hinnom’s din,
To burn their sons and daughters there
In fire, which I gave no law’s share,
Nor did it come into My heart.
32 “Therefore indeed, the days now start,”
Says YHWH, “when it will no more be
Called Tophet, or the Vale to see
Of Son of Hinnom, but the vale
Of slaughtering ground; for then they’ll
Bury in Tophet the last tale.
33 “The corpses of this folk will be
Food for the birds in the sky free
And for the animals on earth.
And no one will shoo them away.
34 “Then I will make come to an end
From Judah’s cities and the bend
Of the streets of Jerusalem
The voice of gladness and of mirth,
The voice of bridegroom and the lay
Of the bride, for the land shall stay
In desolation and in dearth.”

I wonder if this is a promise that
The influence of Zoroaster’s fat
Should come upon the city and the folk
Of Israel beneath the Persian yoke.
The Torah and Zabur are filled with bits
Of Zoroastrian practice in fits,
So why not also let the Parsee towers
Of silence enter in upon the flowers
Of fair Jerusalem? The vulture’s fare
In flesh is good for dealing anywhere
With standing corpses. My Beloved, let me
Forget the body and the spirit free,
And join both bird and least to obey You
While living and while breathing on the view.

JEREMIAH 8

1 “At that time, says YHWH, ”they shall bring
Out the bones of Judah’s each king,
And the bones of his princes, and
The bones of the priests and the bones
Of the prophets, and all the bones
Of Jerusalem’s dwellers from
Their graves, 2 “and they’ll spread them in sum
Before the sun and moon and stars
Of the sky, whom they’ve loved for spars,
And whom they’ve served and after whom
They have walked and whom they for doom
Have sought and worshipped in the gloom;
They’ll not be gathered up or buried,
But scattered dung on earth and harried.

Sin was the moon’s name in the pantheon
Of gods and goddesses of Babylon,
And every star had her own place to fill
Within the temple from sky’s over-spill.
And if not Babylon, Sumer’s great run,
The Persian state was likely to be spun,
For there the stars shone in eternal grace,
The divine omens of the divine face.
Beloved, I look on winter’s veil to see
The sky filled with sidereal canopy
And joy to see its grown immensity.
In summer quite the other way, I find
The sun and moon alone come out to bind
My hopes, delights and fears again resigned.

3 “And death shall be chosen for life
By all the rest left in the strife
Of this wicked family and rife,
That shall stay in the places I
Will drive them,” says YHWH of the sky.

The worship of the stars, the sun and moon,
The glitter-glamour weight of coming soon
In guru-sated ways, pop-stars’ appeal,
All these stretch out beyond the frozen heel
To death beneath the civilized in wheel.
The worship of the stars, the faith today
Resounding in the media to play,
Turns on the carrousel in glad report,
In rocking, rolling, buying, glancing sport,
In stocks and bonds and taking things to court.
My path contrasts in leaves etched in the frost
Of hope and spring and all things without cost,
The round of day and night, the Psalm recited,
The whirling beneath skies of loves requited.

4 And beyond that you’ll say to them:
“So says YHWH: ‘Shall they fall on hem
And not get up? And turn away
And not come back into the way?
5 “Why is Jerusalem’s folk turned
Back in apostasy unspurned?
They keep deceit, refuse the learned.’”
6 I listened and I heard, but they
Did not speak in a righteous way,
No man repented evil deed,
Saying “What have I don’t in speed?
Everyone turned to his own course,
As into battle rushes horse.”
7 See, the stork in the sky knows when
To come and go, the turtle then
And crane and swallow know the time
Of their return, but my folk’s mime
Is not to know judgement of YHWH.

The stork, the dove, the crane, and yet the swallow
In four gates glisten where they come to follow
The grace of hope and fervent knowledge done
That You are Ælohim and so’s begun
The path to Your gracious eternity,
They live without cessation faithfully.
Four birds are signs of four gates in the air,
The earth, the water, fires and everywhere:
I whirl in the temptations of the true,
The heavens and hells of the obedient view,
And find the nest within the humble heart
Where, You, Beloved, return to take Your part.
The stork reminds of law above the church
Now tumbled down in Iznik without perch.

8 How do you say ”We are wise and
The law of YHWH is in our land?
See, He surely made it in vain,
The scribes wield pen without a gain?”
9 The wise men are ashamed to see,
They are dismayed in enmity,
See they have rejected YHWH’s word,
And what wisdom from them is heard?
10 So I’ll give their wives unto others,
And their fields to those who’re not brothers
To its inheritance, each one
From the least to the greatest son
Is given to covetous run,
From the prophet down to the priest,
In all of them falsehood’s increased.
11 For they’ve touched the hurt of the daughter
Of My people with careless slaughter,
Saying ’Peace, peace’ when there’s no peace.
12 Were they ashamed for what they did
In their abomination’s bid?
“No, they were not at all ashamed,
They could not blush when they were blamed.
That’s why they’ll fall with those who fall,
In good time they shall hit the wall,”
Says YHWH to them when He shall call.
13 “I’ll surely consume them,” says YHWH;
“No more grapes on the vine will do,
Nor figs on the fig tree, the leaf
Shall fade; what I’ve given in feoff
Shall pass away from them in due.”

Consume me, my Beloved, consume my fig
That covers the gross body like a pig
Rooting in sore temptations of the prig,
Waiting in vain for one lucrative gig.
Consume me, my Beloved, consume my grape,
Open my stony heart to divine rape,
Ravish the cords and burn the stubble there
Until nothing is left in me but fair.
Beloved, let fade the leaf on my last tree
And lead my soul into eternity,
Without the thought of self in that degree,
But only You, the real and tender bud
Opened and bloomed above the flood of blood.
Then I shall eat both fig and grape and see.

14 Why do we sit still? Come together,
And let us all go into tether
In the walled towns and let us be
Silent there; for YHWH in decree,
Our Ælohim has put us down
To silence and given as to drown
Instead of water gall to drink,
Since we’ve sinned against YHWH to slink.
15 We looked for Islam, no good came,
For time of health, and see the shame!
16 The snorting of horses was heard
From Dan, the whole land then was stirred
At the sound of the neighing herd;
For they have come devouring land
And all that is in it to stand,
The city and those there interred.

The hope after the Prophet was abroad,
And at last heaven came down to kiss the sod
When Umar in six thirty-four came round,
And Abdul Malik the builder was found
In six ninety-one to restore the grace
Of Your temple upon the holy place.
And yet for all the cry of peace, Islam,
The years failed in the waiting for the balm,
And evil came from those hands that should calm
The world of its injustice at the trace.
The snorting of the horses is heard still
In recitation of Qur’an with will,
But what should have been mercy turned to sand
Flowing unchecked out of Umayyad hand.

17 “For see, I’ll send serpents to you,
And cockatrices in your pew,
Not to be charmed away with shoo,
And they will bite you,” so says YHWH.
18 I’d comfort myself against grief,
My heart in me’s without relief.
19 Hear the sound rise up from the cry
Of my folk’s daughter for the ply
Of those that dwell in a far land,
Is YHWH not in the fortress stand,
Is its king not in it? “Why do
They provoke Me to wrath anew
With their graven images and
With foreign idols in the land?”
20 Harvest is past, the summer gone,
And we’re not saved despite the dawn.
21 For grief of my folk’s daughter I
Am also in grief from the sky,
My face is dark astonishment
Taken hold on me and I’m bent.
22 Is there no soothing ointment in
Gilead, and no physician?
Why then is not the health of my
Folk’s daughter regained in the try?

The hills of Gilead still stand today
Remembering the promises astray,
The hopes of Israel, the promised ray,
And still the sun comes up to hear the bray.
The hills of Gilead I saw afar,
And then turned toward Jerusalem by car.
There are not enough days of my life here
To stop to enjoy the balms that appear
In Gilead after the centuries
Of hopes and garments of the narrow breeze.
But in my northern clime I still can mind
The minutes in which I fell then behind
To quote in silence Gilead and then
Pass on my caravan road like all men.



AUTHOR: THOMAS G. MCELWAIN

Copyright © 2007 Adams & McElwain Publishers and Thomas McElwain First Published in two volumes, The Beloved and I 2005, and Led of the Beloved, 2006. Second Edition, 2010 Third and revised edition, 2012 All rights reserved. No part of this verse commentary on the sacred Scriptures may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from publisher.

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