Arboriculture

               Arboriculture                                                 

     Striped with a scourge’s stigmata,

On the middle tree of three,

Was nailed a naked man

Crowned with a wreath of thorns.

     A board above his bloodied head

Titled him ‘King of Jews’, but this

Humiliating spectacle

Of pornographic cruelty

Clearly mocked such regal status

As he hung – agonisingly

Spiked through wrists and ankles –

Suspended from those gruesome nails,

Exposed to prurient regards

And butt of vulgar ridicule.

     Some stories say

That he survived because

He was immortal, God’s own Son,

Destined to rule the universe

     For all eternity;

But other evidence suggests

He died in abject misery

Upon that sanguinary tree.

     Let all believe the outcome that’s preferred:

     Alive or dead, his influence endured.

                                                                    J. A. Bosworth