Progress

In the embers of the last days of my junior citizenship, I continue to revise the prosody of the last 150 posts - it is still rewarding. The presence of a new line in the poem indicates my decision to form the poem in that particular way. Like music, the essence is not in the notes but in the space between them. I am up to psalm 65 so far with a few excursions into later psalms when I find unexpected things that my earlier work missed - like the frame of triumph beginning Psalm 95. As I re-edit each poem, I am changing the title of the post to reflect the new word recurrence.

The easiest starting point is the set of links here. Each one opens a new window so it is easy to close without losing your place and you don't have to search the archive for the next psalm. To help reading, I suggest sometimes copying a bit of text that recurs and putting it in the find window of your browser and let the browser 'highlight all' show you where the frames are. Chrome is particularly good at this in Hebrew since it does not look for vowels so when you copy a word in my lists (even if they are in error) it will show you where this sequence of consonants is repeated. The results can be revealing of what is framed.

A question I am pursuing is 'where is the holy of holies in the Psalter?'  It is there - in the confidence being expressed in the presence of God and in God's salvation - I see it particularly in individual phrases and some of the sudden changes in tone where the poet realizes such confidence.  Perhaps in a later post I will gather my thoughts. In the meanwhile I must pack for 8 weeks of travel in three widely different climate zones.