Learning Hosea's Song
A Novel Modern Commentary on the Book of Hosea
by
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SHOPPING WITH GRANDMA
I’m making a grocery list;
Would you like to help me?
You always add a humorous twist.
To help grandma I did agree.
I thought it a funny caper
To come up with crazy things
Like soap or toilet paper,
Or popcorn and onion rings.
I think that will have to do,
She would eventually say.
Come along if you’re going to,
I haven’t got all day.
Then we’d get in her car
And she’d crank it up to go,
But we’d never get that far,
For she worried so.
What am I forgetting?
I know there must be more.
Can’t you think of something
We haven’t mentioned before?
Oh yes, I know something
That we really need.
I always keep forgetting
To bring home more bird seed.
We go to the store.
She doesn’t use the list,
So I have to remind her,
If you get the gist.
To the garage will you take this?
I’m afraid I’ll see a mouse.
The seed goes on a stack which doesn’t exist,
Then I run back to the house.
11/14/93
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This grandma had been mistreated as a youngster, a fact I came to understand as a preschooler. Although my grandfather never told me much about the details, when I was older he told me that childhood sexual abuse was behind her strange adult behavior. This set of grandparents was kind and generous, and what I learned from them helped me deal with the mistreatment I received from my other grandfather.
I TOLD
Young was I, and innocent,
Knowing naught of grandpa’s bent.
Warming myself by the stove,
Heard a commotion up above,
And glanced up through the grate.
(Spider webs adorned the grate)
To protest indeed had she cause,
For someone else’s wife she was.
He taunted her before the attack –
Naked into the corner she’d back’d.
A sound like jumping on a bed.
Said she, I’d rather I were dead.
When they had come downstairs,
I gave him my hardest glares.
Don’t stare, boy, ya know its rude.
Not as rude as you are crude.
He said I didn’t know crude,
So the following I spewed;
Spider webs between her legs –
She’s afraid of rubber pegs.
You say it is just great,
But I see hell through the grate.
Some say I killed my king that day;
I stabbed him with my verse.
The judges found me innocent,
But my punishment got much worse.
He said that I was terrible –
"That kid is a big disgrace."
I said he was a F.A.T. liar,
And I said it to his face.
He said, "I’m gonna whip you!"
I said, "You wanna bet?"
"How are you gonna stop me?"
"Don’t touch me; my dad’ll kill you yet." *
"I’ll not sit at the table with him any more;
He throws ketchup on the ceiling and ice cream on the floor."
He got up from the table, looking very sore.
"Well, he’s a messy eater, if you know what that means;
Every time he comes here, he always dumps the beans.
I knew why she’d been screaming; he was out of place.
I told him if he touched me, I’d spit right in his face.
Yes, I killed my tyrant then, ere I finished school.
Though he lived for many years, he lived on as a fool.
1/26/93 & 4/19/2001
*He knew I gave reference to a man I’d conversed with on the telephone, not my father. The gangster had called me son, and had told grandpa that if he ever heard I’d spit in his face, he was as good as dead.
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Book Details
About the Book
How would the Biblical book of Hosea, which follows Daniel, read if the title character had been born in 1956 A.D. in the United States of America? Probably more like the ancient original than like this commentary. Perhaps the unspoken story between the lines wound be different as well, but in any era it would stir controversy and provoke serious thinking.
This book, Learning Hosea’s Song, is well described by the subtitle, A Novel Modern Commentary on the Book of Hosea. Unlike a typical commentary, which would go along verse by verse, this work lays out ideas and concepts in poetry and a bit of prose, following the format of a biography of a young couple who struggle to overcome the evil influences of their time, much as the original Hosea and Gomer did.
About the Author
Lewis Miles is a truck driver and sometimes poet who has lived in South Carolina, USA, for the past fifteen years. His years of study and reflection on what the Book of Hosea and other portions of the Christian Bible say about abuse issues found in modern society blossomed into this collection of poetry and prose, most of which he recorded in the 1990s.
He likes to spend his free time with his family, attends church regularly, and enjoys participating in quiet hobbies like bird watching, die cast car collecting, and reading. His favorite sport is NASCAR, his favorite personal vehicle is one that is both paid for and dependable, and his favorite book, other than the Bible, at the moment is this one, because he has put so much into it. One of his children once said his main occupation is being silly, but as can be seen in this work, there is a sensitive and serious side to him as well.