At the Foot of Christ's Passion: Sonnet 2

Like a gutted ox is hung to dry, skin splayed,

Wrath wracked and stretched Your arms out on that tree.

And as eternal terrors on You weighed,

You writhed, “My God, why've You forsaken Me?”

In the wasteland of my sin, I watch You thirst.

My conscience, like Your body, has been scraped raw.

And You, though searching frantic, find You're cursed,

The door of heaven shut by holy law.

Like an apple tree that's naked bleeds for spring,

Perhaps Your hands curled upward as You died.

Beneath this bloody tree I want to fling

Myself and lie with my mouth open wide

As blood like wine flows clean and pure and sweet,

A river bursting from Your twisted feet.

    
(Rembrandt, "The Slaughtered Ox")