Tim has graciously granted me permission to post the poem:
In David’s House
Timothy Murphy
51. Asperges me
Cleanse me of my iniquity
and wash away my sins.
Laugh, Lord, at my obliquity.
In you laughter begins.
Regard our little steeples.
You gave to the High Plains
a flock of sheep, the peoples
who drink deep when it rains.
I shall number all the stones
Assyria has laid low.
I shall number all my bones
as David did long ago.
Oh, what a troubled route man took,
descending from the trees:
cave paintings and the printed book
made on his bended knees.
Lord, the broken spirit,
the sorrows in my heart
are much, much to inherit
and hard, hard to impart.
130. De profundis clamavi
Out of the depths I cry,
the fathomless depths of a sea
from which my soul would fly.
Lord, have mercy on me.
A battlement I walk,
and every other turning
faces me east. I balk
and pray, pray for the morning.
33.Cantate ei canticum novum
A new song for the Lord!
Spring comes to Dakota:
give prayers to the adored,
children of the Lakota,
the Rosebud, Lower Brule,
you, your Germanic neighbors,
ring no bell at a school,
no man bend to his labors.
This is your Eastertide,
so leave unsown the furrow.
Your groom waits for his bride,
the corn waits for tomorrow.
22. Diviserunt vestimenta
They cast lots for my vesture
and pierced my hands and feet—
no rhetorical gesture
but Word of the Paraclete,
advocate for our souls,
forgiver of all wrongs
made on the bed of coals
where David forged his songs.
103. Flos agri sic florebit
To every field, a flower.
To every scythe a pass
where voles and angels cower,
to every gale the grass.
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