Welcome to my Poetry Site

This website provides me an opportunity to share the Gospel with a broader audience than I could ever hope to entertain.  I trust you'll be blessed as you read these lines.

The Poetry of Job

My latest thing has been re-writing the Hebrew poetry found in the Book of Job.
​Take a look at the opening lines of each chapter!
job.I   •   job's first speech   •   based on job 3
Let the day perish wherein I was born, and the night in which it was said, There is a man child conceived.
Job 3:3 • King James Version

Job's Lament

Let the day of my birth disappear from the earth;
how I wish I had never been born!
You don't know how I'm grieved that my mother conceived,
and I hold my conception in scorn.
job.II   •   Eliphaz's first response to job, part 1   •   based on job 4
​Will you get offended if somebody tries to talk to you?
Who can keep from speaking at a time like this?
Look! You’ve admonished many people,
and you’ve strengthened feeble hands.
Job 4:2-3 • International Standard Version

You Reap What You Sow

​Will you find my words too distressing?
Regardless — I really must speak.
For you've been to many a blessing,
and strengthened the hands of the weak.
job.III   •   eliphaz's first response to job, part 2   •   based on job 5
Call out if you please, but who will answer?
To which of the holy ones will you turn?
For resentment kills a fool,
and envy slays the simple.
Job 5:1-2 • Berean Study Bible

God is Just

​​Cry out, but will anyone answer?
For which of your saints could explain?
Resentment will kill fools like cancer;
from envy the simple are slain.
job.IV   •   job's second speech: A response to eliphaz   •   based on job 6
Oh that my grief were actually weighed
And laid in the balances together with my calamity!
For then it would be heavier than the sand of the seas;
Therefore my words have been rash.
Job 6:2-3 • New American Standard

With Friends Like These

​If my grief could be laid on the scales to be weighed,
with my troubles — how great would they be?
Its no wonder my words have been rash and absurd — 
 they'd outweigh all the sand in the sea.
job.V   •   job cries out to god   •   based on job 7
​Is not all human life a struggle?
Our lives are like that of a hired hand,
like a worker who longs for the shade,
like a servant waiting to be paid.
Job 7:1-2 • New Living Translation

Life is Hard

​​Life is hard here on earth and we're working since birth;
do we not live our lives as a slave?
Like one longing for shade or who hopes to be paid;
what is life — but a foot in the grave.
job.VI   •   Bildad's first response to Job   •   based on job 8 
​How long will you say such things?
​Your words are a blustering wind.
Job 8: 2 • New International Version

It ain't God . . . it's YOU

How long will you bluster? How long will you blow?
Like wind, without sense, blasting words to and fro.
job.VII   •   Job's third speech: a response to bildad   •   based on job 9
Indeed, I know that this is true.
But how can mere mortals prove their innocence before God?
Though they wished to dispute with him,
they could not answer him one time out of a thousand.
Job 9: 2-3 • New International Version

The Arbiter

You have said nothing new, for I know this is true.
Are my morals so different than God's?
If I filed a tort, could I answer in court
when a thousand-to-one are my odds?
job.viii   •   job's plea to god   •   based on job 10
I am disgusted with my life.
Let me complain freely.
My bitter soul must complain.
I will say to God, ‘Don’t simply condemn me--
tell me the charge you are bringing against me.'
Job 10:1-2

Created for This?

I am weary of life. I'll complain of this strife;
let my soul, so embittered, cry out.
And to God, let me say, Don't condemn me this way,
let me know what my charge is about.