Charles Randall Stanfield and Thomas Cranmer

Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem

But . . . what then if the death was not that grand,

So noble as the death of martyrs at

The stake but felt like holiness’s brand

Across his total skin, more like a blat

Of agony across his body, whole,

Though Thomas stretched guilt’s hand to take the flame?

For Charles there is no savior to extol

Him when the lightning bolt Christ sent to tame

Chuck’s drug addictions, and his thrusting cock,

Its throbs inside his several wives, the real

Ones . . . and the other holes that felt the shock

Of force against the cervix, burning zeal.

  The Shenandoah River and that bolt

    Brought peace to Charles inside a cock-like jolt.

©  Phillip Whidden