Rethinking the Science of Lucretius
Nature does not care to grieve, they say.
Creation and destruction act as twins
that let the mindless atoms swerve and play.
Love that penetrates a mother's heart
the Romans thought a goddess gave and took,
but beauty is a measure more than art.
They sought to soothe the dread and fear of death
by making all the world be free of passion,
so life is but a feather on the breath.
But love is more than atoms cast aside.
We are the stuff that stars are made of - yes -
but something moving love will still abide.
We see, beyond mere matter, love will stay
through a mother's eyes and tender touch,
as Nature cares to grieve in every way.
VITA BREVIS
A child's skull and bones,
intact after aeons of years,
were extracted from African rock.
It's flat nose and a finger --
a chimpanzee's curled,
habilitating grasp --
caught a reporter's attention,
as the empty eye-sockets
trapped the photographer's shot,
staring from flimsy newsprint.
Apart from her ape-like aspects,
the story noted the up-right
posture the remains suggested
and the hyoid bone in place,
its fleshy tongue lost.
Did she stand erect
and scream words to others
when the drowning waters hit?
And can we trace that flood,
hardened in bits of debris,
the chunks of older cliffs
that mantled the earth's crust,
pushed against plates
tens of thousands, or millions,
of years old, and milled
by erosive wind or rivers?
As you dig in this garden of bones
your silence -- a lever -- inserts
in soil hiding its hardness --
schist and slate in layers.
You turn your back to me,
and only the stones speak.
TRAVEL IN ROME
starlings overhead
flowed like the Tiber River
a murmuration
I rose from Trevi
but my pockets split and I spilled
handfuls of Euros
my mouth discovered
spaghetti carbonara
in Trastevere
strolling with infants
our neighbours made sure that each
was spoiled by us all
in St. Peter's Square
solemn pilgrims were silent
the Pope and I waved.
TRAVELING THE COMMEDIA
INFERNO: Naples
Our hostel room looked down upon a street --
a hell where prostitutes and clients meet,
while tourists hunt for pizza fit to eat.
Naval vessels circle in the Bay,
as ragazzi hustled in dismay
for piddling Euros that may come their way.
The art museum housed a darkened room
with artifacts that filled an ancient tomb
and plaster shapes pulled from a lava tomb.
Our guide showed us the old mosaic floors
that pictured flagrant love and Minotaurs
that in the alleys hide behind closed doors.
We took a train to Paestum, further on
a spiral down the coast, before the dawn,
to temples where the worshippers were gone.
We plucked the bleeding poppies and walked far
to find an iced Negroni at a bar
and feel just like a blond, Fellini star.
* * *
PURGATORIO: Rome
La Dolce Vita multiplies one sin
to seven, like the Hills that hold them in
while traffic horns still raise a jazzy din.
This Piazza's marble Wedding Cake --
a monument for prideful ego's sake --
displayed how Fascist grandeur was a fake.
As we kissed where passersby saw us,
our greed for love was boldly gluttonous,
and we performed to make them envious.
Like drunks, we scaled the lofty Aventine.
The hand the Mouth of Truth bit on was mine,
when I blasphemed by calling you divine.
Near the top, at Malta's guarded door --
through the keyhole -- we beheld much more
of Rome we toured so slothfully before.
There at an Earthly Paradise we feel
a call to swim undressed and see how real
our sky was mapped by lights sidereal.
* * *
PARADISO: Florence
We left behind in Naples and in Rome
our struggles. Now the Duomo's noble dome
made us feel that we were coming home.
We sought for sleep, like Michelangelo
had carved, then strolled where tourists come and go
to painted saints by Fra Angelico.
Relieved at last from every body ache,
we splurged like Florentines on marbled steak
and planned the perfect photos left to take
of saints we never learned to know or name.
Like Dante, we were lost halfway, and came
to give each other more than half the blame.
Our weary steps were placed on Jacob's Ladder --
pushing, pulling -- always getting madder,
and wept in Arno's flood as we grew sadder.
But then when all our journey's days are done,
to the Gates of Paradise we run
and hope that Love still moves the stars and sun.
Royal Rhodes is a poet and essayist who was born in Brookline, MA, and now lives in a small village in central Ohio. His poems have appeared in literary journals in the U.S. Canada, the U.K., India, and Singapore.
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