SAINT SEBASTIAN

A rose is arrows is eros
- Julian T. Brolaski

A gnarled tree or a marble      pillar, it doesn’t matter.

The most attractive cliché:      depicted far too young to be

a captain of the Praetorian Guard.      It was the artists

of the Renaissance anointed him      patron saint of

male beauty (Antinous being      too pagan, too

passively subservient):

surrogate crucifixion,      the ideal of the age:      quattrocento

ephebe,      bonelessly androgynous      slumping against

his bonds,      or cinquecento athlete in marble      arching

provocatively contrapposto      toward the viewer.

Eyes on God,      the heated blood      seeks exit in

ecstasy;      each arrow a little bird of longing,

the desiring gazes      of the multitude.

Blood seethes.      His body is a fleeting prayer,

not his martyrdom.      That isn’t resignation,

but triumph:      heroic weakness.      His life is

irrelevant,      but his death      is a second life

as paint-bright Autumn      is a second Spring.