This (I can hardly call it a poem) is based on Nehemiah 4 in which Nehemiah and the work of rebuilding Jerusalem’s wall is opposed by Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite. It may be a spoken word hit piece. The question always comes back, who’s the one hit or who gets taken down?

Sanballat, you stinky polecat,
You heavy-handed, fat-headed rat
You poser, you loser, you boozer ding-bat.
Tally these up on your clay ledger mat
Suck on them eggs you viperous diplomat
And stash them in your skanky velvet hat
You blithering boob of a bureaucrat!
Whatcha think about that, Sanballat?

Tobiah the Ammonite, you parasite;
You feast on misfortune, you buggy blight
On humanity, doing good only for spite;
You imagine other’s success as a slight
As if it all were about you, amiright?
You are as alive as a barrow-wight
What you love are the deeds which you do at night
Which you always do when you get lit, get tight.
But one day you’ll be drug out into the light,
And you will fall, fall, so far from your great height.
I’ll say it again, Bruh, if you like,
Tobiah the Ammonite.

Thank you God, that I am not like them
Who use people, do with them all they can,
Evil-Doers, not just every now and then.
But Me? I have given a tenth of every yen
I’ve made, given time and time again;
Oh how I thank you that I am not like those men.

Lord, How many times must I forgive a debt?
He answered with parable, with a gospel net,
Caught me in a trap, and that trap upset
My truce between resentment and regret,
My long record of all I was owed, kept–
A list from A to Z, an alphabet
Of wounds which chained me so I’d never forget,
To which I’m still chained, and still not free yet.

Who will rescue me from where I am at?
From being a Tobiah, Sanballat?
Would He give what I deserve? Give tit for tat?
Pay me out, squash me like some pesky gnat?
Or would He in love, take the blow, be spat
Upon, scorned, become sin, be a doormat
Become for me, Tobiah and Sanballat?

© Randall Edwards 2019.
This poem is for Christ’s church. If it is helpful, please feel free to copy or reprint in church bulletins, read aloud, or repost. I only ask that an attribution be cited to myself (Randall Edwards) and this blog (backwardmutters.com). Thanks.
Artwork: James Tissot (French, 1836-1902). The Pharisee and the Publican (Le pharisien et le publicain), 1886-1894. Opaque watercolor over graphite on gray wove paper. Brooklyn Museum, Purchased by public subscription, 00.159.178 (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 00.159.178_PS2.jpg)