Horror Vacui
(from Cock-crow III)
 
For all its beauty, Venice has been cursed.
The shades of Shylock and von Aschenbach
lurk behind closed doors. Soon after dark
Sebastian Flyte inspires a giant thirst
on balconies above the Grand Canal,
where discontented sons of millionaires
console each other, high on Baudelaire’s
philosophy of life, Les Fleurs du Mal.
Come Carnival they’ll all be sporting masks,
assuming alter egos by the score.
They’ll carry on the way they did before
but now feel free to flaunt their pocket flasks.
A lethal dose elicits no surprise.
Each gondolier is Charon in disguise.

A wide variety of metrical and rhymed poems/songs assembled under nine significant moments from moonrise till dawn. In each of the final 13 sonnets a 14-word aphorism appears when only the first word in each line is read.   “His combined sense of meter, rhythm and phrase is powerful – and among the most accomplished of any poet currently writing traditional poetry. This acrostic form he’s created is a bravura show-piece. There are probably only a handful (meaning fingers on one hand) of poets who could manage it as slyly and insouciantly.” Patrick Gillespie, poet and blogger.   “These rhymed and rhythmical poem-songs show great structural skill, and are clever, knowing, lyrical and funny.” Robert Wilkinson, editor of The Passionate Transitory. This ebook is available from the publishers, NordOsten Books.

If you have any comments on this publication, or questions about it,  Duncan Gillies MacLaurin would be pleased to hear from you.