Oh God, don’t judge me.

This poem playfully reverses the psalmist’s stance in Psalm 26 while attempting to stay as close as possible to the original imagery and structure of the psalm. Rabbi Kleinbaum has been telling us this from the start: if you don’t know what else to say about the psalm, just try to rewrite it. Take out a thesaurus and go! Don’t fear “it’s not really my own voice” or “this is just an exercise in synonyms.” That is a truth that masks the fingerprints of your selections, your diction, your image.

I have been reading Mary Oliver’s The Rule for the Dance, so, naturally jumped at the chance to play with the deliciousness of meter, verse, and rhyme. Is it my favorite poem? No. But I enjoyed the process of reading closely with the psalmist. If you are looking for a way to meditate on the psalms, I do encourage you to do as Rabbi Kleinbaum taking one, line by line, and speaking it anew.

writingAlicia FowlerAugust 17, 2021writing, psalms, poetry, bibleComment

For the Father

Inspired by Psalm 21

writingAlicia FowlerMay 11, 2021writing, poetry, bible, psalmsComment

The world’s foundation’s laid bare.

Psalm 18 reprises David’s speech from 2 Samuel 22, which celebrates his deliverance from the hand of Saul and his enemies. In both versions, the Psalm and David’s speech, I was struck that David hands perilously over the waters of the deep after God’s intervention. David later comes to take on God’s action in the world, seemingly meting out vengeance on every last living child of his enemies. So I returned back to God’s dramatic and physical arrival on scene and asked what happened.

writing, poetry, religionAlicia FowlerMarch 15, 2021writing, religion, bible, poetryComment

That time I illustrated a Psalm

illustrationAlicia FowlerFebruary 24, 2021religion, illustration, bible, poetryComment

For you will not abandon me

On and off through the pandemic, I’ve turned to the Psalms either individually, or as part of the Morning Prayer. In December, I decided to join CBST Synagogue’s daily Psalm Text Study. For each Psalm we create our own offering, if we want, in reaction to what we felt, learned, or even hated in the Psalm. After sitting out two Psalms offerings, I delved into Psalm 16. I envied the Psalmist’s trust in redemption, in forgiveness, in a path. I wished I could hear the Psalmist’s invocation of God as a model. Instead, I only heard the funny ways those close to us use our goodness to harm us, how we harm in return, and these cycles of past harms try to dictate who we can be. Yet, trusting, as this Psalmist did, in Divine grace, I choose new life.

poetry, writingAlicia FowlerFebruary 24, 2021writing, poetry, religion, psalms, bibleComment

Black & Queer Pride

The summer of 2019 I worked at Lab/Shul for my supervised ministry. Intense, might be the only word to describe it. I’m so proud of the work we did to launch Partnerhood, the new community membership program.

Coming back to my blog, I’m realizing I never published a mini-sermon I gave at our Pride Shabbat Queen. Rabbi Amichai asked me and a couple others to speak about our ‘pride moment’. Mine was about Black and Queer Pride.

writing, sermonAlicia FowlerJune 6, 2020sermon, bipoc, queer, homosexual, black, religionComment

A memory of difference

This semester I’ve grappled with W.E.B. Du Bois’ harrowing works, and a wealth of Black Radical scholarship that has followed in his footsteps. I have also spent time getting more in touch with my Puerto Rican roots, discovering my mother’s story, her mother’s story, and her mother’s mothers. This piece is a part of a creative exercise to grapple with that knowledge and truly encounter myself, and others.

writing, poetryAlicia FowlerApril 20, 2020bipoc, ancestry, poetryComment

Gimme, gimme, gimme

Throughout the book of psalms, and really the whole Bible, we find oracles of lament, or hope, or woe. While the formats vary, generally, these include a invocation, a reckoning, and an acknowledgement of the ultimate goodness of God. In this oracle, I kept to the overall structure, while challenging our expectation of the format and tone.

writing, poetryAlicia FowlerFebruary 18, 2020religion, poetry, writing, funny, psalmsComment

Homo Fomo of Biblical Proportions

After reviewing the clobber passages in Leviticus, I had a sudden pang of homo fomo. I recalled the fundamentalists’ signs that God hates faggots, but never one that God hated lesbians. While I would prefer to not put words in the Divine’s mouth, I was curious. Did the rebbes remember the ladies? Read on for more.

writingAlicia FowlerApril 4, 2019academic, bible, prose, talmud, lesbian, homosexual, queer, gayComment

Keeping in the difficult stories

The opioid epidemic took away my cousin much too soon. As the fuzzy childhood memories of Bradley’s goofiness flooded my brain, I wrote his obituary. But after I wrote it, I felt conflicted. What do we say about the awful stories of our lives that respects the dignity and personhood of those whose voices are silent? I wrote about the experience for my course on Gender and Sexuality in the Hebrew Bible which explored these kinds of questions.

writing, proseAlicia FowlerMarch 9, 2019family, death, religion, bibleComment

Blog