for osm
New
…wears off all things:
Shoes and cars,
Christmas stars,
kings and golden rings.
But love we’re told
If it is true
is always new
and never old.
I wonder if Odysseus
Half-heartedly
across the sea
divined the mess
he’d left behind:
a comely wife,
a married life,
love, of a kind.
Or did he mishap know
that temporality
is love’s infirmity
for us below?
We lack the angels’ plight,
their scope–
even a rope–
to scale their height.
And so we think
love is our portal
to the immortal
as down we sink.
No love’s not love
that alters when
the clock strikes ten
or fate plays rough.
Love’s the state whereby
we’re crazed to think
that passion’s blink
will never die.
* * *
I thought (the cheek!)
I’d found love true
In someone new,
and she was chic.
Her kisses fell like flakes
to ground–
She had me bound:
And Ah, the stakes!
She said, You are my only
heart’s desire–
Oh purple fire:
Make me unlonely.
And you, I said in trembling tone,
Are Chinese food
Not bad, not good,
–Was that my phone?
We sowed the field prodigiously
From summer’s call
Until the fall
religiously.
But what is new is never
Love and thus
this us
was not forever.
She packed her bag (the jerk)
and said
It’s dead
It didn’t work.
***
But Love’s not work, at least
the kind
that’s blind.
like the Cretan beast.
Love’s old at first hello,
Recognized,
not improvised
like Waldorf Jello.
Love says (the same) to each,
a simple word
barely heard,
touching without reach.
Love’s sad, right from the start
the rain
unexplained,
creation without art.
And love will find you hollow.
Thus, Jack and Jill
against their will
do leave the hill and follow.
***
The moral is beware the new
It’s shade
Will fade
For her, and you.
rjh/23/08 2013
The New Oxonian 
Dear Mr. Hoffmann:
It is clear that you love language, with a passion that is manifest.
It is clear that you love poetry, and this is a remarkable interest for a biblical historian.
It is also clear that you love sharp analysis of texts and you delight in sophisticated critical studies of other scholars.
Those three passions go together in the same mind. Often music would be a natural companion to the linguistic ones.
So, may I ask you, when are we going to get a few new critical studies of biblical texts or sharp commentaries of recent developments in the scholarly literature?
Not that it should restrict your poetical output. But recently your poetry had literally displaced your scholarly critiques. Can we foresee a return of your prose output as well in the near future?
The New Oxonian has been too silent in that neglected department.
Or is there a more fundamental reason for this radical change of the center of gravity in your production?
Are you devoting your research time to the preparation of that book you had mentioned you might tackle, the defense of the historicity of Jesus, against the likes of Arthur Drews.
I recently reread in depth George A. Wells “Did Jesus Exist?” (1987) and the “Christ Myth”, and was astonished by the freshness of both texts.
Also, one special request, which I hope is not too much out of line.
If by any chance you have any influence on Jonathan Kurtz, president of Prometheus, perhaps you could send a word or two concerning the need for a new edition of George A. Wells’s “Did Jesus Exist?”.
If you remember the book, as I am certain you know the book (which I read on your own recommendations in this site, when you literally said “and they are still worth reading”, you will have noticed the miserable quality of the physical product (I am speaking here only of fonts, margins, readability of notes, quality of paper, size of pages, etc…). I have complained bitterly to Jonathan Kurtz on the lamentable edition by his firm and on the need for a new, comfortable, readable, and durable edition of what remains an important text.
I am sure that your love of language extends to a keen interest in the typographical presentation of texts (as is visible in the New Oxonian), and you have often in your writings always shown respect for G.A. Wells’s scholarship.
Perhaps your name might have a more effective impact on Jonathan kurtz and prod him into starting work on a high-quality 3d edition of “Did Jesus Exist?” (1975/1987).
Thanks for your attention.
that’s sweet, hiding a little sadness
That’s sweet human ‘love’ – how about divine love?
John Hick: “God purposes unconditionally to guarantee the highest good and blessedness to ever human”.
Correction: “ever human” should read “every human”.
Reblogged this on The New Oxonian.