The staircase's third question, no hiding in the sub-scopes: all things considered, which is better? 88 won beauty upstairs and it matters — but "better" for a psalm includes what it can carry, and 23 carries the dying, the grieving, and three thousand years of them. The aspect votes made this verdict harder, not easier, which is what they are for. Narrow, in honest tension with the beauty verdict above.

Recompression is a third judgment, not an average — the aspects split (139 took beauty, 23 took comfort) and the tiebreak has to come from somewhere else. 139 contains more of the whole psalter in one poem: the wonder, the terror, the ugly honest rage, the being-known. 23 is the better single note; 139 is the better psalm. Cast at 6:5 because I believe it and barely.