Italian Poems

Corbezzolo

Arbutus, strawberry tree,
giver of the sweetest of fruits,
the corbezzolo,
which yields the bitterest
of honeys.

Corbezzolo, small, red fruit
with a deep orange flesh,
you are not ashamed of who you are.
I have heard it claimed
that you look like a lychee:
Basta!
Nothing could be further
from the truth.

Corbezzolo, quintessential Mediterranean fruit
that even the locals are unaware of:
clearly your lack of recognition
is a sign of the world’s decay.

I will leave other people to crunch
on their tasteless apples,
while I sink my teeth
into your profusely seeded flesh.

If the Serpent offered Eve
a corbezzolo,
the fall would have been worth it.

Corbezzolo, little red & orange egg,
will your seeds fertilize my soul?

Just as Zeus took the form of a swan
and made Leda fecund,
I wonder if Aphrodite or Artemis
have taken the form of this fruit
to fecundate me?

If so, is it possible to have an extramarital affair
with a piece of fruit?
Assuredly, it is, but in the case of the corbezzolo
it would be worth it.

That all shall be saved

“Salvation” that doesn’t
include my dogs,
or that majestic old oak
outside my window
is no salvation at all,
but Hell.

Those who claim there is no salvation
    are deluded.
Equally deluded are those who claim
    that salvation is selective.

All that lives in this realm
    has purpose,
and all of it shall be saved,
down to the smallest blade of grass.

Even the man on the street,
immersed in his screen,
will be saved,
though his path to salvation
will be much longer and more arduous
than that of
brother dog,
sister oak,
and cousin grass.

Jesus Christ

Dionysus, smart fellow that He was,
knowing that the Greek civilization was ending,
and the time for the Gods to abscond from the world approaching,
decided to take refuge in the land of the Jews,
in the form of an infant…
who was to become a carpenter.

Dionysus / Osiris / Jesus, crafty God
of death and rebirth
knew how to get out of a tight spot,
but when He came face to face, in Palestine,
with the Hebrews—that most legalistic race of men—
the God of dying
and resurrection
decided to teach the Jews
the doctrine of Life
and the truth of Resurrection…

For this, they crucified Him.

He resurrected,
showing them the truth of His teachings,
but even Gods are subject to
certain immutable laws,
so it was time for
Dionysus / Christ,
last of the Olympians,
to leave the world,
for a cycle was coming to a close,
and humanity destined to face
a desert of the soul.

Dionysus would still be the answer to the call,
but who calls any longer?

What of those who cluck out the sacred Name
of Jesus—Sun of Mary—like chickens?

As Blake stated: “The vision of Christ that thou dost see
    Is my vision’s greatest enemy.”

Dionysus / Christ is the God of LIFE,
but Christianity is a religion of death;
it is afraid of life,
and so implores its followers to
mortify the flesh.

Eventually, people rebelled against
this death religion,
only to create something infinitely worse.

Now, we live in a world without life,
where even those with a beating heart
bow down before lifeless gadgets.

Is there any hope?
YES!
Invoke Dionysus-Christ
in the name of Life,
and live life to its fullest.
Do so, and He will
answer your call,
fructifying your spirit.

Portovenere

Entering the San Pietro church
located on the site of an ancient temple
to Venus,
one instantly stands still
and attends.

There is a sacred presence here,
but there is nothing Christian about it.

Venus, namesake of the town,
is a dark, savage God
who wants blood;
she wants you to sacrifice yourself
on her altar.

Not sacrificing as to Jesus,
punishing the body,
and hardening the heart,
but sacrificing all that
saps away life
in this modern, lifeless, world.

Are you willing to forego modern conveniences
to taste bliss?

If Jesus had to do it all over again,
I believe would choose to forego the cross;
instead sacrificing himself on Venus’ altar.

Lorenzo and the Saint

San Lorenzo,
    patron saint of librarians
        and the poor (in money,
            not in spirit)
    gave everything
        society claims has value
            to the destitute,
    and he exhorted others
        to do the same.

For this great act of generosity,
the powers of his age
roasted him alive.

What they didn’t realize
    is that Lorenzo didn’t give away
        his most valuable possession:
            Life, which he had an overflowing
                abundance of.

They burnt him alive
    killing his body,
        but freeing his soul.

Life is not dependent upon
    the body,
and Lorenzo was so full of life
    his body could no longer
        contain his essence.

That which was,
is,
and may never not be.

San Lorenzo is still alive,
basking in the rays
of the source
of Being.

Fast forward nearly two millennia:
David Herbert,
sickly son of an Eastwood coal miner,
found under the same Italian sun
that reared San Lorenzo,
the strength and inspiration
to present to the world
a new gospel of life,
the greatest gift to the world
since the gospel of Christ.

The world repaid this modern Lorenzo
with insults and abuse.

Even to this day,
the woke masses—
who wouldn’t be fit to wipe Lawrence’s ass—
denigrate the name of the man
who was infinitely their superior.
These are the robots,
and their lives are empty,
wasted deserts;
their souls amphora without wine.
They are destined to wander,
lost,
through the lower levels of existence
as hungry ghosts.

Lorenzo,
and those who follow his gospel,
living fully,
while building ships of death,
are destined to experience
blissful theosis,
and closeness
to the
DARK GOD.

The Meaning of Life

Be careful about searching for
the meaning of life:
If you take the cocoon
of a would-be butterfly
between your hands
in order to hasten its emergence,
because you selfishly
want to see the beautiful insect,
it will emerge,
only to die
shortly thereafter.

Similarly,
if you race after the meaning of life,
you,
as soon as you think you have grasped it,
will find it stillborn
in the palms of your hands.

Seeking meaning in life
wastes life’s meaning.
Instead, simply live.
Life, after all,
is beyond “meaning.”

Aging

In youth,
one tends to focus on
doing
and
having.

Most people never
    move beyond this.

For those who age with wisdom,
doing & having
fade away
into simply being.

At the Archaeological Museum

How is it possible
that the images
on Etruscan urns—
relics of a long vanquished people—
have more life—
far more life—
than the people looking at them,
including the author
of this poem?

Gulf of the Poets

Gulf of the Poets,
you must now be feeling so lonely:
You were well aware that each age
only produced a handful of poets,
and you could live with that,
knowing that your transcendent beauty
would be an inspiration to men
with great hearts and great minds;
men such as Lawrence, Shelley, and Byron.
But now, for the first time in history,
since man started using language,
there are no poets,
only versifiers.

Until this cycle ends,
and poetry returns to man,
your waters will be our only
contemporary poetry.

Political Parties

I have often been asked whether I belong to the “left”
    or the “right.”
The leftists are mindless automatons
    who follow life denying ideologies
        and I hate them!
The right-wingers chase the scent of money
    like a male dog who has gotten a whiff
        of a bitch in heat,
            and I hate them too!
I follow no party
    but the party of life.

Seeing as how I belong to the
    party of life,
you may assume, correctly,
    that I am pro-life.
I am pro-life…
    and for that reason I support abortion.

Life is a conscious decision,
    not an automatic event.
Trees and leopards are alive
    because they choose to be.

Most humans choose to be
    among the living dead.

So go ahead: get your abortions,
    in good conscience,
    and jump off that bridge while you are at it:
There are too many people.

Giving birth to more babies
is inherently anti-life,
since this population bomb
will abort all life on this planet
one day.

German

Just as Lawrence’s heart fluttered for Frieda,
    despite the fact that she—
        a strong Teutonic beast of a woman,
        who chain smoked next to her tubercular husband—
    couldn’t have been more different from him
        in every way,
I, knowing full well that I would have been a victim
    of Hitler’s Reich,
can’t keep my heart from singing
    every time I hear the German language…

Or is that “singing”
the feeling the Jews felt
when they heard the terrifying, thumping, sound
of Schutzstaffel boots
marching on the pavement
outside their shops?

O God, it must be my heart telling me to run;
run from the northerners,
and their violence—
violence against the entire order
of creation.

Foreign Tongues

Sometimes it is a great advantage
to be in a place
where you don’t know the language.

Not understanding the people around you
    makes them so much more bearable!

Olive Oil

I am uncomfortable:
A gathering around a table,
in a restaurant,
with family members,
and prospective family members.

Social gatherings make no sense to me,
unless I am in a grove,
surrounded by my friends,
the trees.

Restaurants also baffle me:
why eat out when food
is better, healthier, and cheaper
when made at home?

The party chit-chats
and makes small-talk:
something I have never been
able to do,
so I stare blankly,
and silently,
thinking of our burning world,
and my next verses.

“Why so dour?”
“Oh, nothing more than the fact
that the world
is going to Hell
in a hand basket!”

The waiter brings wine:
I do not partake;
too many years as a Muslim,
and seeing its evil effects on others.

I am a Dionysian,
but of the olive,
not the grape.
Little known to most,
Dionysus was the God
of all fruits,
not just fermented grapes.

I chose to order nothing,
as the menu
filled with foul flesh
is less than appealing.

Ah, but a bottle of olive oil
is brought round,
so I pour it in the wine glass,
inhale the scents of the
lymph of the olive
and the volcanic soil
from which it came.

Then, as I sip this nectar from the Gods,
the waiter rips the glass from my hands
and condescendingly tells me—
as if I am out of my mind—
“In Sicily, oil is for dipping bread in,
not for drinking.”

I reply: “But bread is the purview of Demeter,
and my loyalty is to Dionysus.
May I please have my glass back?”

“No.”
“No?”
“Fine, vaffanculo!”

I up and leave.
My rage that night was holy,
and revenge will be consummated
through the will of the Gods.
“Whom the gods would destroy
they first make mad.”