A Love Sublime

Lesson five: The Stretch Your Style Workshop - The Monotetra
Monotetra - Four quatrains with end rhyme, comprised of three lines of four feet, with a two-foot refrain at line four.

Prompt (optional): A pastiche of a favorite poet
Element: alliteration

This assignment is an adaptation of a Gjertrude Schnackenberg pastiche. She is the poet who, in my humble opinion, has written the perfect poem: Supernatural Love




        A Love Sublime

Consider all the sadness borne,
Condemned, defiled, and put to scorn,
A crown of piercing bloody thorn.
A sheep is shorn! A sheep is shorn!

The Roman found no guilt in him.
Beaten, bloodied limb from limb
The mob cries out its hateful hymn:
"Away with him! Away with him!"

With humble, willing attitude
His father’s word his only food,
With pallid, bloody face imbued
Embraced the rood! Embraced the rood!

Oh! How she suffered at the sight,
Of him who on a peaceful night
Was born beneath a starry-light.
When all was bright! When all was bright!

If they could punish her instead,
Alas, his path she cannot tread,
In pain recalls the words he said.
In fear and dread! In fear and dread!

“I must obey my father’s will,
This cruel prophecy fulfill,
Disgraceful death upon a hill.
For you I will! For you I will!”

He’s weak from all the blood he’s lost,
The tree is split, the timbers crossed,
By soldiers to the ground he‘s tossed.
Oh. Such a cost! Oh. Such a cost!

His head and healing hands now bleed.
With spikes and straps they do proceed,
Assisting Satan to succeed.
An evil deed! An evil deed!

The timeless leader of the proud,
Who cunningly controls the crowd,
Demands the final funeral shroud.
I weep out loud! I weep out loud!

A vengeful wind whips up the sands,
A cry echoes across the lands,
Commends him to his father’s hands.
The king commands! The king commands!

His spirit sent, his soul released,
A sacrifice from victim/priest
His flesh from fiendish pain released.
A sacred feast! A sacred feast!

As Sunday dawns, at break of day,
Toward the tomb without delay,
“But who will move the stone?” they say.
It’s rolled away! It’s rolled away!

word count - 302