Recently I was commissioned to write a poem on one of the Bible’s most enigmatic figures, King David. I was inspired to look into that moment in time when David as a young man chooses stones for his sling to defeat the giant, Goliath. I figured if I could live in that moment with David I could get a good glimpse of what his entire life meant and maybe even get a good glimpse of the meaning of all of our lives. Here is my attempt, entitled Stones Chosen.
Kneeling at the water’s edge
His eyes are filled with searching.
The man child crouches down to find
The giant’s surest ending.
His thought…. It’s in choosing.
Ripples in the quiet stream
Glisten dappled sunbeam worries
Over floating stick, sundry leaves and a
Sudden assortments of prize projectiles.
It’s always in choosing.
The wind whistles through the reeds accusingly,
As sparrows coax choked chirps
And the man child swallows the tart taste of doubts
All of which share the same query
What do you think you’re doing now?
It all about the choosing
Some stones are an afterthought.
Some chosen by mass, others by their merit.
The man child goes for neglected ones
For he knows what it’s like to be forgotten.
Orthoclase feldspar, Rust flex breccia
Sharp edged shale and even darker obsidian
Water laps his digging hands as distant
war drums beat their bitterness
As the giant’s taunts grow with heaviness
As fear flows in waves of weariness
As the tension builds in an army’s reticence
Knowing David’s avarice is limitless
The day feels brittle and pale
It all about the choosing
He sensuously rubs his sight against
one rock’s wet curves and crevices
Even as a youth his eyes
Are drawn to life’s allurement
He moves beyond this enticing pull
Avoiding this trap for later
‘Cause you know it’s in the choosing
Seeing himself within the stream
His hope is in the knowing
of every facial crease, in a furrowed brow
of want, and need and winnowing
But what about the choosing
The brown one smooth,
The grey basalt pale green,
The keen cleft copper one.
The blue beryl rubbed raw,
The hewn angled crag.
He’s choosing stones like he chooses notes on his lyre
He’s choosing stones like he chooses words for his songs
He’s choosing stones like he chooses options
To punch, to pour out or praise
Five stones find themselves next to a sling in the man child’s shepherd’s bag
Such small stones alone they are,
but building blocks for much.
For promises, for family lines
For formation, foundations, for trust.
Alone they are disappointed things,
But together they are of legend.
The hope of a fledgling kith and clan
Of messianic making.
It’s in the choosing
Just a moment of calm… before calamity
A moment of peace for breathing.
A moment where God and his chosen can be.
Before a giant falls, a kingdom collapse, and another in its rising
in response like this water in its stirring.
Soon there will be a sling in hand,
And with it all the whirling.
The spin of humanity and divinity,
The turn of time and temperament,
The spiral of potential and proclivity,
In the rotation of every love and love lost.
Soon there will be the whirling
of deception and authenticity,
of exacting revenge and cutting the corners off cloaks!
For the story is in the choosing!
Life… longed for… is in the choosing!
Our heart torn for tears in the choosing!
One soul dies yet another on lives, is in the choosing!
Freedom’s found or cell door shuts, in the choosing!
Rape, relinquishing, 4 slugs to the skull, lengths of lynching rope, cross, tombs, empty graves, gathering devotees to policy or prophecy
it all in the choosing
It’s in the choosing
It’s in the choosing
It’s all in the choosing
It’s always in the choosing!
As the man child stand erect.
At the creek bed of what is to be.
He chooses these rocks because they are loved.
Not loved because he chooses,
Not because they are perfect, or popular or even preferred
Or that their flight path is known to be true.
He stands there with a lingering sense
This is in God’s eyes how he is viewed.
You can own this as a sacred truth or disregard it in the losing
But leave holding this one thing:
It’s all within the choosing.
