Sweet the Wood, and Sweet the Nails

By Royal Rhodes

---

Some ancient saints said crucifixes spoke --
just tales we thought designed for simple folk.

Yet now as all my terrors I must face
I hear my name, but voiced with matchless grace,

channeled by the artist in this art
that both convicts me and redeems my heart.

My will be done -- not his -- my self-volition
bred despair that hungers for contrition.

A toxin -- my devices and desires --
poison heart and lungs as life expires.

Catastrophes this routed flesh must bear,
as drugged and dying eyes at nothing stare.

My sight-lines now must zero in on loss,
yet shadows hold the outline of his cross.

Light from Light, the Logos took on flesh
that let humanity and Godhead mesh.

Can mortal darkness break in sudden light?
A poet wrote this: Look ! The West grows bright.

Like the tree in Eden at our Fall,
this tree restores that Paradise for all.

Like me, he wept, yet wiped my every tear.
Love itself is what had brought him here.

---

Royal Rhodes taught religious studies for almost 40 years. His poems have appeared in various journals, including Ekstasis, Ekphrastic Review, The Seventh Quarry, and The Montreal Review, among others. His poetry and art collaborations have been published with The Catbird [on the Yadkin] Press in North Carolina.

Royal's other work on Foreshadow:
A Road Through Ohio Spring (Poetry, April 2023)
A Pilgrim's Song (Poetry, May 2023)
Journey to Silence (Poetry, July 2023)
Remember David (Poetry, July 2023)
Magnolia (Poetry, October 2023)
A Morning Walk into Light (Poetry, November 2023)
A Crisis of Angels (Poetry, December 2023)
Birth Night (Poetry, January 2024)