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Welcome to
High Romance's
Marriage
Spices #2
Song
of Solomon Game
Get into something
comfortable, or nothing at all if that's comfortable, and snuggle
up with your lover and your favorite book - the Bible. Open to the
Song of Solomon, and begin reading to one another. The book is written
as if the man and woman are talking to one another. So read the parts
that belong to your gender. Take turns if the speaker(s) are wedding
guests and so forth...
If you make it
to chapter four, take your time. Read, then act out each verse's description(s)
of affection. The person who's role the verse belongs to gets to "interpret"
that verse as he/she pleases, except if her/his spouse expresses dislike
for the activity. If you're both tender and biblical (!!) we don't
think there will be many such problems.
Here's the NRSV's
rendering of Chapter 4:
4:1
How beautiful you are, my love, how very beautiful! Your eyes are
doves behind your veil. Your hair is like a flock of goats, moving
down the slopes of Gilead.
2 Your teeth are like a flock of shorn ewes that have come
up from the washing, all of which bear twins, and not one among them
is bereaved.
3 Your lips are like a crimson thread, and your mouth is lovely.
Your cheeks are like halves of a pomegranate behind your veil.
4 Your neck is like the tower of David, built in courses; on
it hang a thousand bucklers, all of them shields of warriors.
5 Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle,
that feed among the lilies.
6 Until the day breathes and the shadows flee, I will hasten
to the mountain of myrrh and the hill of frankincense.
7 You are altogether beautiful, my love; there is no flaw in
you.
8 Come with me from Lebanon, my bride; come with me from Lebanon.
Depart from the peak of Amana, from the peak of Senir and Hermon,
from the dens of lions, from the mountains of leopards.
9 You have ravished my heart, my sister, my bride, you have
ravished my heart with a glance of your eyes, with one jewel of your
necklace.
10 How sweet is your love, my sister, my bride! how much better
is your love than wine, and the fragrance of your oils than any spice!
11 Your lips distill nectar, my bride; honey and milk are under
your tongue; the scent of your garments is like the scent of Lebanon.
12 A garden locked is my sister, my bride, a garden locked,
a fountain sealed.
13 Your channel is an orchard of pomegranates with all choicest
fruits, henna with nard,
14 nard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of
frankincense, myrrh and aloes, with all chief spices--
15 a garden fountain, a well of living water, and flowing streams
from Lebanon.
16 Awake, O north wind, and come, O south wind! Blow upon my
garden that its fragrance may be wafted abroad. Let my beloved come
to his garden, and eat its choicest fruits.
5:1 I come to my garden, my sister, my bride; I gather my myrrh
with my spice, I eat my honeycomb with my honey, I drink my wine with
my milk. ...
We don't think
you'll make it much past chapter four! And that's the High Romance.
One variety of
the above is to not only read the lines and perhaps act them out,
but also stop and discuss what each of you finds meaningful in the
verses as they apply to your own relationship. Sex, yes, but also
the romantic longings and hopes expressed by the lovers.... do you
have them, and have you ever? Can you rekindle them together? We think
so!
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