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August 3, 2021
Justin Burnett
The Place of a Skull
The unfortunate
Marketability
Drives me like a comic Jesus
Making a scene, brandishing
A switch, playfully
Chasing away the other poets,
Cutting up
Christianity
In a brave New Testament
He shall sell;
A coquet
With so many
Substances in
His beard, hushing rumors
So they spread,
His long hair
Girlish, posturing
His two front teeth upon
His lip as
He’s flagellated
By the hulking
Centurion. Passionately,
I don
His crown, laurel
Stuck into the brier,
Blackened by the fruit.
“Hosanna!” They pick me up
And place me
On the back of the ass,
Fanning me with palm,
And trot me off
To Golgotha,
To watch the fulfillment
Of my career.
Justin Burnett is a house painter from Marblehead, Massachusetts, who now lives in Salem. This month he is featured in 14 International Younger Poets, edited by Philip Nikolayev, a new anthology from Art and Letters.
Viscous Verses is edited by Raquel Balboni and Ben Mazer (editorsartletters@gmail.com).