Last Words

Hallelujiah! Glory Hallelujiah!
This is so great today–today I see it.
The righteous man, that old sinner who
started listening to God,
Now he is blessed!
He is blessed in beautiful ways.
It is God who blessed him,
and his kin are blessed too–
Blessed through him–by God!

He wrote his obituary, and its a good one.
God is in it. God wrote it. God loves it.
He isn’t afraid of being bad news.
He’s good news.
God is in him, and that is the news.

There are poor and sick folks who recall him,
Because he’s God’s man,
The righteous man lives on,
He’s God’s man,
and his work endures.
His Word endures–in the righteous man.

C 2012 Thomas Bolton

About 13 years ago, I started writing poetry in response to scripture.  My first poem in 1998, after a 30 year break from poetry, was my interpretation of Psalm 112.  I called it The Righteous Man.  It started me on a new path of writing.  Since then, I have often included a fifteen minute poetry exercise for my adult classes.  Last night, I had my group in Disciple Bible Study write on Psalm 112.  After some protests, they did a great job.

The poem above is my effort at that exercise on Psalm 112 last night.