Psalm 139, An Expressive Transliteration

You’ve searched me, LORD, you know me most precise.
You know when I sit down and when I rise;
my thoughts, from far away, by you, observed.
My lying down and going out, discerned;
you are familiar with all my turns.
Before a word is on my tongue, you, LORD,
know it completely. Both behind, before,
you hem me in and lay your hand on me.
The wonder of such knowledge, me, exceeds,
too lofty for me to attain myself.

Where can I go from where your Spirit dwells?
Where can I flee from where your presence is?
If I to heaven, there, you still exist;
I make my bed, the depths, you too are there.
Upon its wings, the dawn’s, and fly through air,
if settled on the far side of the sea,
e’en there your hand, my path, guides certainly,
your right hand will for certain hold me fast.
If I say, “Surely darkness ‘round me wraps,
and light is like the night all ‘round my place,”
e’en darkness not as dark before your face;
like day, night shines, for darkness, light to you.

For you created me, with life imbued;
together knit me in my mother’s womb.
I praise you for ‘twas fearful, wonderful,
the way you made my life; I know that well,
they’re wonderful, your works. Was not concealed
from you, my frame, when in that secret place,
down in the earth, its depths, when I was made,
was wove together; what your eyes there saw:
my unformed body; in your book as law,
the days ordained for me before they came.
Your thoughts, O God, each day leave me amazed!
How vast the sum of them, were I to count!
Outnumber grains of sand on seashore’s ground—
when I awake, I still, with you, remain.

If only you, O God, the wicked slay!
All you bloodthirsty ones, from me, away!
They speak of you with evil, their intent;
your adversaries do it violence,
your name. Don’t I hate those who’re hating you,
O LORD, abhor those whom your rule eschew,
rebel against you? For them, what I feel
is hatred, counting them my enemies.
Search me, O God, and know my heart that beats;
test me and know my thoughts made anxiously.
See if offensive ways I have in me,
and in the everlasting way, me, lead.

Psalm 121, An Expressive Transliteration

Up to the mountain top, I lift my eyes.
The place from which my help would emanate?
My help comes from the LORD, who made the skies.
Both earth and heaven, they are what he made.

Your foot allow to slip? He never will.
He watches over you and never sleeps.
The same who watches over Israel.
No slumb’ring, sleeping, watches that he keeps.

The LORD keeps safe from harm, your life preserve.
Your life is what he constant watches o’er.
Your coming, going, what the LORD observes
both at the present and forevermore.

Psalm 55, An Expressive Transliteration

For the director, musical; with strings.
A maskil wrote by David that he brings.

Please listen to my prayer, O God, do not
ignore my plea; please hear and answer me.
My thoughts, great trouble to me, I’m distraught
because of what he says, my enemy,
because of all the wicked and their threats;
for they bring down great suffering on me,
their anger, their assailings, they beget.

My heart within is anguish unto me;
fell on me, terrors, death’s, most weightily.
Fear, trembling, both of them, have me, beset;
o’erwhelmed me, horror. Said, “if I could get
wings of a dove, I’d fly away and rest.
I’d flee and in the desert I would stay;
I’d hurry to my solace, shelt’ring place,
far from the tempest and the stormy wastes.”

The wicked, LORD, confuse, confound their words,
for I see violence, and strife ‘gainst men
within the city. Daily, prowling herds,
about its walls; there’s malice, harm within.
Destructive forces, in the city, work;
both lies and threats, the streets, they don’t dessert.

If ‘twere an enemy insulting me
I could endure; a foe against, I’d flee.
I’d hide, but it is you, just like myself,
a man and my companion, friend, known, well-.
with whom I once enjoyed sweet fellowship —
at God’s house, where we walked ‘mongst worshipers.

May death be something of a dark surprise
to all my enemies; go down alive
into death’s realm, for, with them, evil lives.

For me, I call to God; the LORD saves me.
I cry out in distress, morn, noon, and eve,
he hears my voice and rescues me unharmed
from battles waged ‘gainst me, though not alarmed;
they may oppose me, many. God, enthroned,
he’ll hear them, he’s not changing from of old,
he’ll humble them; they have no fear of God.

Companion, mine, attacking all his friends;
he violates his sacred covenant.
His talk is smooth as butter but within
his heart, there’s war; his words more soothing than
sweet oil, yet razors, swords are all of them.

Your cares upon the LORD where you should cast
and he’ll sustain you; never in the past,
the righteous, shaken, God, he won’t allow.
The wicked to the pit, you will bring down.
Bloodthirsty ones, deceit in all their ways
will never live out half their normal days.

But as for me, I trust you LORD, always.

Thucydides and the Kangaroos

Adopted by the Aborigines
when just a babe, his name: Thucydides.
The contract with Adidas that they had,
The Copa Mundials, how they are made,
with leather made from hopping kangaroos.
His spirit animal: Hilocometoot.
And Chalm the family name put on his crest.
That special leather stretched, and worked the best.
The family who for generations owned
the ranch that T.H. early made his home.
What was their worth? For long a mystery.
That kangaroos are used for football cleats.
The boots that players, soccer, on their feet.
These leaping beasts, attraction at the zoo.
They’re worn by Rugby Union players too.

Orlando Furioso

“Your hippogriff to Ethiopia,
Astolfo, fly, and somehow find the cure.
Drove mad by my love for Angelica.
My wits are lost, my love that she has spurned.

“That country, Eden’s mountain, find St. John,
a revelation for what you intend.
My reason to a magic bottle drawn.
Then aid Senapo, Paris he defends.

“A vehicle in Afrique’s continent,
All things lost on the earth, found on the moon.
To heaven drive Elijah’s chariot.
To Charlemagne, his service, very soon.”