Selected Poems

by Wim Coleman

Part II: Psalms of You

© by Wim Coleman, 2011

All rights reserved.

 

*

 

                        Psalm 151

 

You

            is the mantra of mantras

            the talisman word

 

You

            is the text of the mass

            not to be uttered backward

            for that is the way of hate

 

You

            is the space between voices

            the measure of that space

            the bridge across

 

You

            is the blade that severs

            the needle and thread that mend

            the gasp of delight

            the ache

 

*

 

                        Psalm 152

 

For you

I shall dance naked in the passages

to the sound of timbrels

heard by only you and me,

turn cartwheels on the crosswalk

at three o’clock a.m.,

and know that you have made me

just a little lower than the angels

and given me dominion

over intersecting streets;

even as the phosphorescent vapor

rises from the pavement

and as the dormant cop car

watches quiet disbelieving

and as the lead gray box behind me

clicks its tongue and buzzes at my back

and as that quick and luminous red

pupil dilates with rage

                                      I shall not fear

for I am fed with music:

I am satisfied.

 

*

 

                        Psalm 153

 

Kindly

you vanished in my moment of direst faith,

lifting your stone anchor out of my bowels,

leaving me well and whole in my unbelief.

So why,

just when I knew that you are not and never were,

do you burden me again with that horror of great darkness

which has no name but love?

For now

the sun itself splits wide with pain

as searing as the marigold petals

that light the way home for the dead out of Sheol.

 

*

 

                        Psalm 154

 

To seven of you I say—

sing this psalm to seven more among you

that you may sing to seven times seven more

and seven times seven times seven times seven

until the promised beginning;

for the all-creating end is past,

while the all-obliterating start awaits.

 

Sing with a tongue dipped in indelible dye

and sound the word in abiding vibration

upon the drumhead of papyrus or wood pulp

so that all may hear these yet-uncomposed words.

 

If you try to break this chain

(which you cannot even if you may)

you will tighten it to your discomfort;

lengthen it that you may dance in your disintegration.

 

In the end

there was no word.

Sing this psalm

so that in the beginning

the word shall be written.

 

Yea, to seven of you I sing,

although there is no I to sing,

but only the riddling you.

 

*

 

                        Psalm 155

 

My rage at you

is like a wasp I watched

oh so long ago

hurling its heavy abdomen

time and time again

against the hot ceiling light bulb

as steaming venom fell

to the cold basement floor.