Lollards

So far as I can tell, this heretic was a follower of John Wycliffe, a reformer of sorts, burnt at the stake, and the term Lollard derives from a mutterer, ie to be found mumbling over the bible.  No mumbler here.  It is the defamatory names that stick, apparently "Cathar" is a dirty word, and that for a noble cause.  I think. 

The Heretic  

As times allow the heretic
decries the pulpit from his soul,
flies in the face of common dogma,
and has no truck with blood and bread
with a faith his own.

Close cousin to the heckler,
objecting to gold ornament,
places trouble before intellect:
Give me Death or give me Honour.
Farewell William Balowe.

 ‘An herretyke ibrende at the Towre hyll’
railed against his jailers, so:
               ‘…no priest had no more power
to hear confession than Jack Hare!

What means this, Priest?  On Goode Fryday
ye fill the sepulchres with gods
but since they cannot rise themselves
at Ester Day you lift them up
and bere them for the, or else they will
lie still in their graves...’

No passive witch to be upended,
drowned, dunked-in the village pond:
put to the question, bid recant
and all his words recorded.

In chains before Saint Dominic,
hands en-grimed and eyes upon
a devil’s fire before the church:
whose bell rings out for William?

An heretic, bridling at icons, sure,
as if in mockery of God
to mimic resurrection.