No God but the Gold Forged in the Furnace of Flesh       Jakub Lejbowicz slithered east   Beneath a heretic’s curse.   A worm of rot, crowned in Ottoman dust,   He wore another man’s face —   Berukhiah reborn   Jacob Frank, Westerner of Podolia,   Messianic pretender.     In Salonica, blasphemy transmuted:   Sin kissed the breasts   Of someone else’s wife.   Torah pressed into palpable skin,   White fire turned utterly black.   Apostates writhed.   A thousand hearts ruptured,

Cometh the Lion     Cometh the Lion, cometh the hour.   On his head is my name; on his back is my power.   The time is narrow, and the...

Father O'Sinner   Father O’Sinner is not his name (not quite),   Though it should be and not O’Connor,   Which was the name bestowed...

“Stuck in this uneasy station, what else To do but to let these words I write (Knowing that you, Son of God, Will never write anything,...

Exile, or ignominy, or bonds, or pain   You must wait for courage or grace but fate Is stubborn. Waiting is very long, like exile, And is...

Contraction After the fusion of blood and tree, I descended, the voice of derision singing in my ears, past the wet-green eyes of my...