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.
Comments
Post a Comment