“Stigmata of a Poet”
By M. Allshouse
Stigmata of a poet—
Marks no man can see.
They chart the path I’ve walked:
A gift bestowed divinely,
A curse questioned endlessly.
The world kissed me like Judas:
A betrayal before I understood the cost.
In Gethsemane, I wept unarmed—
Condemned before I ever sinned.
A poet of human experience—my trial.
Kept alive only to be mocked and ridiculed.
Barabbas finds sanctuary,
But I am left forsaken.
Sentenced since birth
To bear the burden of emotion
I was never prepared to hold.
Each moment of anguish—
A metaphorical flogging.
Forced to wear happiness like a robe,
Contentment like a crown of thorns.
Stigmata of a poet
Is to bear the cross.
To understand love and humility,
Yet be forced to carry them—
Solitary.
Undone.
My poems are my Golgotha—
Words nailed to a cross for all to see.
They are my deepest sacrifice
As I lament in such grief:
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
Stigmata of a poet
Is three hours of darkness—
The most sacred parts of me
Thrust before an audience of my unraveling.
They feed me praise laced with gall,
But I refuse—
The why was never for applause.
I lay my psyche in ink—
For the masses to read and misunderstand.
I am no messiah of a promised land;
I gather the gospel of where I began.
Our roots, though winding,
Have all been the same.
But I am the one
Destined to shoulder the blame.
So as I offer myself in martyrdom
To try and unbind your mind,
Let the temple veil be torn.
Pierce me with your spear.
I offer salvation—
But you refused the divine.
Stigmata of a poet—
I do not bleed blood and water.
No—
This is all I am.
Every last part of me
Hung on this cross.
I do not seek fans.
I need kindred eyes
To witness the burial
And see clarity through my eyes.
Who look on as I’m wrapped in a shroud—
Come, strike the stone,
And mourn not me,
But the part of you I held.
You’ve found
A voice that’s known your ache
Since the womb.
Stigmata of a poet,
Bestowed upon you from the tomb.