Meeting Bosch at the Prado

He says: "Let me introduce you to
some friends of mine: The Diabolic,

The Apocalyptic, The Mad Psalmist
and the carved misericords."

We step through the triptych door and I
am dazzled by the beauty of his garden.

The great rock trumpets a flume of birds
and a be-cherried nymph, white as milk,

strokes my cheek - aspiring to God's touch.
"There" says Bosch. "Wave to Adam and his Eve -

dewey-eyed and pious, attending to
their father." I do so and he ushers

me into bright sunshine - a raucous earth-scape
of delights, flocculent with the naked -

with horsemen and ladies, sensual, be-witching,
be-fished and be-fruited, every pore of their

delicate skins glistening with spiritual
excess. "It is a paradise of holy desire"

he says. "A state of being we all once
knew. Come - let us reclaim it."

He pulls me into a darker realm, a place
where pot-ash pollutes the air and bonfires

illuminate the night sky. The cries
of the diseased, the night-terrored

and the dispossessed puncture my ears.
Bosch laughs. "I am the Tree Man" he whispers.

"Wait awhile and let me flourish."
I wait. And I wait. Has he forgotten me ?

I call his name. My clothes melt away;
I am left naked, numb and cold.

The savagery of the night-troopers
bristles my skin. In the midst of it all

I see Bosch's half-smiling face
floating on a body of pale wood and bark.

"You are not forgotten my friend" he says.
Stand patiently in line and await your fall."