Bathsheba Not even white dresses, fresh blossoms or the despairing angels hovering could change the fire that seized you the night after she was through her period and her womb lay open and fertile, beckoning you, arousing you, leading like a siren. Not all the concubines combined could deter the beckoning of history, not even the memory of how Michal saved your life could break the trance of Bathsheba as you saw her bathing and allowed lust to set your breath and soul on fire, until there could be no euphony but your body with hers emitting the percussion and wail of passion, until you could have her beneath you, her eyes widened and brightened by your driving sin. And when death seemed the answer, you dispatched it with all the authority of God’s king, all the madness and delirium of greed and guilt. You chose your love from forbidden quarters, and Solomon’s soul sang in the marrow of your bones. (from “ Stations in a Dream” , D...