Affirming, yet again, that we cannot divine authorial intent, is the similarity in Charles Reznikoff's "Te Deum" and Psalm 131. The bind of Jewish inheritance is clear; it overrides whatever Reznikoff was thinking.
" O Lord, my heart is not proud
nor my look haughty;
I do not aspire to great things
or to what is beyond me;
but I have taught myself to be contented
like a weaned child with its mother..."
and
"Not because of victories
I sing,
having none,
but for the common sunshine,
the breeze,
the largess of the spring.
Not for victory,
but for the day's work done
as well as I was able;
not for a seat upon the dais
but at the common table."
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