The Covenant of Rhapsody of Light by Adesiyan Oluwapelumi

 

THE COVENANT

Do not fear for I will be with you,
Even in the deep waters

I will hold your hand and lift you high
When the quicksand seeks to drown you.

Even in the storm, I will guide you.
 I will be with you in the day of trouble,

I will deliver you & never let you alone.
   Even when the bat that flies by night

perches on the shoulders of your house,
    I will let no evil befall you, for you and

your home will I keep, & for your children's
   children will I be a guard. When you call

on me I will answer. When you cry to me,
    I will  comfort you. I will protect you from

the adder, & the fowler's snare. In darkness,
   I will be your light, & in chaos, I will be

your order. I will never let the plague
   come near you, & under my wings, I will

keep you. I will be your shield & buckler
  in times of strife, & my dwelling shall be

your safe abode. Tribulations may arise
   on your left, & right, but it shall not come

near you, for I will keep you in my heavens,
   & my peace shall I bequeath to you.

Surely, my goodness will I give to you, not as
   the world gives. I will stand between you,

& death. I will never leave you. This is
   my covenant to you, my Beloved.


RHAPSODY OF LIGHT

Across the face of a new dawn,
an orchid blooms in sunlight-lustre
in a sea of rosewater.
A prism of mutilated light
pares the skin of the river.

Again, my bones quiver into sonatas—
a thread of light stitching my sinews
into ribbons. A prayer escapes my lips:
Dear Lord, keep the sanctuary in my heart
& a zephyr sweeps embers of grace
into my eyes raking the cataracts,
a bride of wiildflowers colonized
by a colony of forsythias.

I see it now—the whitened breath
scorched of tremor in the shadows,
the fingers clasped at the threshold of heaven,
the opened windows, & the silhouette
of a white dove plummeting.

I fall into flight,
& it is a rapture that ladders me
into a rising rhapsody.

Revelation:

I stretch my hands to the skies,
& a confetti of goodness drenches me
in their opulence. Spirit, lead my feet
to walk upon the waters, & not faint.
I beckon to your oil-lamp.
I, a name folding into the mouth of my God.
On the last day, He called light.
& I became. & I was light. & I sang glory!