This is legendary,

Probably.

 

When Botolph pillaged Burgundy

And stole Gengulphus’ Rod from a reliquary

He thought he was about

Divine appointed

Duty

 

He planted the naked wand in the precincts of

A long abandoned Celtic chapel

Across the Channel Sea

 

The desiccated stump

Like Aaron’s Rod

Flourished to a spreading

Yew tree

 

St Botolph’s Abbey

Built upon the foundations of

The Celtic ruin

Remains today

Picturesque

Crumbling.

 

Lightning struck the imposing gothic pile.

An itinerant stonemason

Hanging from a rope

Chipping at a gargoyle

Lost his grip

And slipping 

Tumbling

His fall broken by yew tree branches

Pinioned and suffering

Agonising disembowelment

Uttering foul fulminations

Against his Maker and his fate

Blasphemed until his breath expired.

 

The hell bound cursings

Snarled in the canopy

Then absorbed through foliage

And by osmosis fouled the trunk

Trickling to the roots.

Where gluttonous termites of distrust

Feasted

 

Then winter lightning

Struck again

And the tree was split

Unwilling to let it fall

The call went out

For the Master Carpenter

And his son (if available)

For bindings

So that

Ropes and dowels,

Craftily hid in knotholes

And coffin glues from horses’ bones

Poured to cloy the woody flesh entangled fibres.

Might keep Gengulphus’ rod tree

Rotting edifice upstanding.

 

The spreading yew stands still

The propped up centrepiece of countless

“Say, Cheese!” morning suited

Family groupings

Cellophaned into albums

Until the day when lust spun fantasies fade

And the insistent reality

Of sublime dishonest detachment

Demands divorce.

And the guilty party’s image

Snipped, or ripped

Leaving (typically)

The virgin white dress bride

Linking arms with a headless despised

'Someone not worthy of a mention'.

 

[Gengulphus – is a patron saint of failing marriages]