Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Belated Answer

Too busy! But re "digs him up again" in Mesabi below: the ref is from Ezra Pound in his pre- Modernist period; from "Sestina: Altaforte", his sketch of the warrior troubador Bertrans de Born. He prefaces the poem:

"Dante Alghieri put this man in hell for that he was a stirrer up of strife.

"Eccovi!

"Judge ye!

"Have I dug him up again?"

It then begins:
"Damn it all! All this our south stinks peace..."

proceeds through "...In hot summer I have great rejoicing/ When the tempests kill the earth's foul peace..."

and "There's no sound like to swords swords opposing..."

and ends with the bloody bard howling "Hell blot black for always the thought 'Peace!' "

NOT your regulation sensitive poet type...

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