Poetry
Letting My Hair Down [27 Christ-Centered Couplets]
I hate poetry. It’s blue-collar work. Like a bricklayer, poets grind out an existence one word at a time.
Words become sentences, sentences become stanzas, stanzas become poems…over a period of days. Weeks. Even months.
One fourteen-line sonnet can demand fourteen hours to craft. And then you are not even sure it’s any good.
The process is long, brutal and nasty.
That’s why I like the couplet. You’re only dealing with two lines of five to six words each. Unless you’re writing thirty-nine couplets…like I did with the Old Testament last week.
Or twenty-seven couplets…like I did this week.
I paint a painful picture. Tongue-in-cheek, of course, because I enjoy the final product with a smug self-satisfaction.
So, I hope you experience the same kind of satisfaction after reading these couplets…without the work, of course. Let me know what you think. And have a great Friday.
Matthew
The meek revolutionist surpassed Moses—
Unheard, he redeemed the broken masses.
Mark
Soon I must be isolated, sifted—
Follow me, to death, that none would be wasted.
Luke
God mingled with women, children, heathen
Through Christ-man, who sought the lost with passion.
John
Believe for eternal: the wilderness
Exposed the lamb, the light come out of darkness.
Acts
I witnessed Peter babble on the balcony—
His hair and mouth aflame like cranberries.
Romans
A purity is unearthed from the gospel:
Purity embraced alone by faith, by people.
First Corinthians
The cross of Christ conforms the man-carnal
Into a separate, holy being, just and eternal.
Second Corinthians
Beautiful in decomposing being,
The divine light of the Gospel is burning.
Galatians
Crushed with Christ, exhausted, the yoke, the thong
Broken—don’t turn and put them on again.
Ephesians
His people swarm like molecules, his body,
The church, a husband and wife entity.
Philippians
Like a tree loses its leaves, Christ abandoned
His deity; to give us joy, he descended.
Colossians
In Christ we hide, the emptied deity—
In Him dwells the fullness of Godhead bodily.
First Thessalonians
The pure dead first, then, sublime living, ascend
To meet the Lord who will from heaven descend.
Second Thessalonians
Live for, exalt Jesus in your crucible
And suffer to become dark and beautiful.
First Timothy
My boy, elders should be sacred and sane,
Immersed in our rare mystery alone.
Second Timothy
Then solider, farmer, domestic utensil
Imitate as worthy servants of the gospel.
Titus
Tell each Cretan to be sober and sane,
Like a fragrance they should adorn our doctrine.
Philemon
The ancients permit you to destroy this man,
But remember, you’re no longer a slave, so forgive him.
Hebrews
The backbone of this book, dense and verdant,
Is salvation ends in Christ incarnate.
James
Faith breeds works: Abraham did, in faith, offer
The body of Isaac on the altar.
First Peter
Why so strange that you suffer and burn?
We must shadow Christ, even in resurrection.
Second Peter
Do not mourn as bereft of Christ’s return—
The longsuffering of God is salvation.
First John
As little pure children pass through light,
Be happy and gay, love incarnate, like Christ.
Second John
Madam, I joy! You and your brood are couth.
You love and obey God, you walk in truth!
Third John
Old bountiful Gaius, your servant hood
Has nurtured pious wanderers real good.
Jude
Avoid the dark dreamer who inhabits
The land of Cain, Korah, and Judas.
Revelation
Exit the dragon—descending from the sky
Is the abode of God, his pure, rare bride.
Letting My Hair Down [Morbid OT Couplets]
Long ago I was a poet. Born and bred to be obscure.
Eventually, I got my clock cleaned as an advertising copywriter…and learned the trade of clear, concise and compelling copy.
Shortly before that happened, though, I bent over my desk…Bible in hand…and summarized each book of the Bible into a couplet.
What’s a Couplet?
Nothing more than a two-line poem that rhymes. Some couplets are metered…like the heroic. Some aren’t…like mine.
Good couplets snap, both in rhyme and sound. Bad couplets plod, artificial in rhyme and sound.
I’ve got both.
I mean, imagine trying to summarize a book of law like Leviticus. A book of history like First Chronicles. Or a mammoth prophet like Isaiah.
So warning, some of the following couplets snap. Some plod.
This Friday I give you the Old Testament. Next week I’ll give you the New. [Update: New Testament couplets.] Let me know what you think.
Genesis
Sun and vine, horse and man: creatures of garden
Alone until woman–then, enter dragon.
Exodus
Moses redeemed the enslaved Hebrews
From Egypt, led them through the Red Sea, too.
Leviticus
An altar of bulls and rams and doves burnt
Was the old Hebrew way of atonement.
Numbers
Rebels, lethargic beneath their thick tents,
Murmured like arid wilderness insects.
Deuteronomy
Incantation of the law to love the Lord
With your whole heart, soul, mind is not absurd.
Joshua
You, who conquered, Canaan, melancholy
Men, don’t betray God and be unholy.
Judges
The cycle of imperfect deliverance
By judges: sin, salvation to silence.
Ruth
See the heathen sways with grain reapers–
Led to glean and wait for her redeemer.
First Samuel
Bear-throttler boy slays giant, wins the throne.
Postponed by Saul the insane–David, semi-alone.
Second Samuel
Saul dead, David reigns, waters the kingdom
Till nude Bathsheba. Uriah, we’ll blame.
First Kings
David dead, old monarch Solomon woos
Foreign women (Elijah burns wet wood).
Second Kings
Elijah is possessed by fire, so
Are both kingdoms of Israel disposed.
First Chronicles
Annals of Adam through David, the ideal
King to establish holy israel.
Second Chronicles
With cedar, stone Solomon builds temple
That sin decomposes; exile of people.
Ezra
Cyrus allows exiles to follow Ezra
To restore their temple in Judah.
Nehemiah
Nurture the stones and the wall will blossom–
Bow and banish strange wives and you will bloom.
Esther
Shushan Jews, fast for me–my maids will too.
If I perish, I perish, saving Hebrews.
Job
The pure, pale Job emptied by hell’s violence,
Bewitched by the wind–the dark voice bred silence.
Psalms
Born before mountains, you wardrobe’s water–
Calm, by it I lay, and sing of Savior.
Proverbs
The fear of the Lord is the origin
Of knowledge, the cradle of discipline.
Ecclesiastes
You will not smile, epicure, when,
Bereft of moisture, you waste under the sun.
Song of Solomon
The husband chose from his harem of flowers,
A lily–they slept in her childhood chamber.
Isaiah
Diviner of Babylon holocaust,
Soothsayer of consolation through Christ.
Jeremiah
The celibate poet wore a yoke, a thong
To warn of banishment, deep and long.
Lamentations
Bereft of city, poet sings funeral ode
To deaf daughters: o souls, mourn to God!
Ezekiel
Wasted bones began to waft around me
Flourishing like sulphur butterflies.
Daniel
In the pure waste and ash of asylum
He heard seventy messianic logarithms.
Hosea
I shall lie, love, with a whore who won’t love Me.
Bride, bear children who will leave.
Joel
A heathen swarm of locust have eaten
The vine. Repent–the old, young will dream again.
Amos
Wild horticulturist cum oracle
Blend visions: waste and wet earth, beautiful.
Obadiah
Edom, through you set your nest ‘mong the stars,
The Lord will dismay, exhaust you by fires.
Jonah
At the whale-belly dweller’s cry, the city
Collapsed, dissolved, and prayed for God’s mercy.
Micah
The mountains and hills swarm to witness both
Man’s judgment and the coming of Christ’s birth.
Nahum
Rest, Judah, in the blossoms of cedar
While I walk Nineveh off to thresh her.
Habakkuk
When the just wither and fade, Lord, I loathe
To ask you, why do pagans thrive? “Live by faith.”
Zephaniah
Holy, holy Lord, allow Judah to waste,
Heathens to waste–clear, gather Her at last.
Haggai
Do not neglect to build or plant fig groves
Or drape a curtain inside–Christ must disrobe.
Zechariah
They shall look upon the face, Zechariah,
Of Him they’ve pierced–the Messiah.
Malachi
The estranged desert souls will be nurtured
Back to greenness by a half-naked shepherd.
Did I mention I’ve got a morbid streak? That’s probably why I enjoy the Prophets the most. And poetry in general.
Which books of the Bible’s are your favorite? Which couplet did you like best? Do you write poetry? Did you know April’s National Poetry Month?
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