Stories in Verse E-Book

Mitchell Isaac Friedman

• Herausgeber: BookRix
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Beschreibung

I set out to write a poem in which Virgil is finally, after seven centuries, rewarded for his role in the salvation of Dante, by leading through the landscape of eternal damnation, to the Earthly Paradise and into the hands of Beatrice, during Easter week of 1300. "Virgil in Paradise" was the result.

As I progressed in the work on "Virgil in Paradise" I started thinking, "Why not an entire collection of poems that tell stories?"

The response to that questions is Stories in Verse.

Leseprobe

Mitchell Isaac Friedman

Stories in Verse

For Ilene, Danielle, and Jordan Friedman In loving memory of my parents William and Lillian Friedman BookRix GmbH & Co. KG81371 Munich

Virgil in Paradise

It was I

who led the

lost poet

along the path

of eternal woe,

toward the summit

of Earthly joy—

where my task

dictated I must

leave him

to the care

of worthier hands.

My task completed

I returned to

the eternal state

which was my

ordained place—

back to Limbo,

where I resided,

not in torment

but sans all hope.

Greater wisdom

than I could ever

hope to possess

decreed that those

born before

that blessed era

must reside—

as did I—

within that vestibule:

neither punished

nor rewarded.

This restriction

I accepted, coming

as it did,

from

Supreme Justice.

Thus I resigned

myself  to

that place

with no complaint.

No thought had I

that I should ever

again see

either of those ladies

in whose hand

I left the poet—

or that

blessed summit

And so,

I passed

the centuries

in company

of poets

and of thinkers

whose eternal lot

was predicated

upon their

having been born

too soon.

I took consolation

in the exchange

of ideas

and philosophies

with those

whose work

in the mortal realm

brought them

the semblance of

immortality.

And in this state

I spent

seven centuries.

Seventeen years

into the seventh century

that self-same lady

who had entreated me

to gude the lost poet

appeared to me

once again.

“Look upon me,

dear Virgil.

You remember me,

I trust,”

she said.

Seven centuries

are, indeed, as

an eternity to one

who marks the

passage of time,

as we in that

nether region did.