A Season of Psalms and Poetry

...because that's what I'm in. Two for today:

Admonitions To A Special Person
by Anne Sexton

Watch out for power,
for its avalanche can bury you,
snow, snow, snow, smothering your mountain.

Watch out for hate,
it can open its mouth and you'll fling yourself out
to eat off your leg, an instant leper.

Watch out for friends,
because when you betray them,
as you will,
they will bury their heads in the toilet
and flush themselves away.

Watch out for intellect,
because it knows so much it knows nothing
and leaves you hanging upside down,
mouthing knowledge as your heart
falls out of your mouth.

Watch out for games, the actor's part,
the speech planned, known, given,
for they will give you away
and you will stand like a naked little boy,
pissing on your own child-bed.

Watch out for love
(unless it is true,
and every part of you says yes including the toes),
it will wrap you up like a mummy,
and your scream won't be heard
and none of your running will end.

Love? Be it man. Be it woman.
It must be a wave you want to glide in on,
give your body to it, give your laugh to it,
give, when the gravelly sand takes you,
your tears to the land. To love another is something
like prayer and can't be planned, you just fall
into its arms because your belief undoes your disbelief.

Special person,
if I were you I'd pay no attention
to admonitions from me,
made somewhat out of your words
and somewhat out of mine.
A collaboration.
I do not believe a word I have said,
except some, except I think of you like a young tree
with pasted-on leaves and know you'll root
and the real green thing will come.

Let go. Let go.
Oh special person,
possible leaves,
this typewriter likes you on the way to them,
but wants to break crystal glasses
in celebration,
for you,
when the dark crust is thrown off
and you float all around
like a happened balloon.

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Psalm 30

I will exalt you, O LORD,
because you have lifted me up
and have not let my enemies triumph over me.

O LORD my God, I cried out to you,
and you restored me to health.

You brought me up, O LORD, from the dead;
you restored my life as I was going down to the grave.

Sing to the LORD, you servants of his;
give thanks for the remembrance of his holiness.

For his wrath endures but the twinkling of an eye,
his favor for a lifetime.

Weeping may spend the night,
but joy comes in the morning.

While I felt secure, I said,
"I shall never be disturbed.
You, LORD, with your favor, made me as strong as
the mountains."

Then you hid your face,
and I was filled with fear.

I cried to you, O LORD;
I pleaded with the Lord, saying,

"What profit is there in my blood, if I go down to the Pit?
will the dust praise you or declare your faithfulness?

Hear, O LORD, and have mercy upon me;
O LORD, be my helper."

You have turned my wailing into dancing;
you have put off my sack-cloth and clothed me with joy.

Therefore my heart sings to you without ceasing;
O LORD my God, I will give you thanks for ever.