Breathe...in through the nose, out through the mouth....
How do you fill a soul emptied by love so chaotic, so beautiful, so intensely defined by the sweetness that encompasses all that is bright and beautiful in this world?
To let it go, the narrow line, defined and redefined over time, pulsing through fingertips that follow the heart's tears into oblivion...
Because that’s the river it flows upon, undone, wild and ravaged and torn,
And at the same time, it’s as essential as the air one breathes.
Try to replace it; replacements are lacking,
Try to remove it; you are lacking,
Try to flow with it; it will destroy you,
Try to deny it; it also destroys you.
Fingers travel up swollen lips, kisses long gone but dawn sees them on the horizon again,
Taking from one, to feed another bliss, another kiss, to destroy some fanciful daydream of a world without you in it;
Clenching inside, a desire so bright it could light fires in a thousand worlds...
But I must let go. How?
Naked, softened flesh, rolling upon the sheets,
Meeting daydreams with nightmares as hands travel down a colorful navel and further still,
Bring me back into oblivion, that final resting place where my mouth adores your skin, but my soul adores us more,
Bring me there, please, I need release.
Shuddering, shivering, quivering with lust as touch heightens all,
Falling from the known into the known, the trembling that ruptures like volcanic ash after an explosion rests between my thighs;
You, me, us....transcendent, beautiful, painful, love...and I concede;
For there is nothing in this world, like you and me. I’ve tried, it is lacking.
But I am love, and I am not lacking; The taste of your love, is the sweetest bitter I’ve ever known.
Mi Amore,
Mi Amante,
My whole, in a world full of pieces.
Pompeii was a Roman town near modern Napoli, in the Campania region of Italy. Along with Herculaneum and many villas in the surrounding area, it was mostly destroyed by the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 and covered in up to twelve different layers of tephra 4 to 6 m (13 to 20 ft) deep, which rained down for about six hours. The eruption has been dated to 24 August, one day after Vulcanalia, the festival of the Roman god of fire (including that from volcanoes), based on an eyewitness account of the event written a quarter century later by Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus (“Pliny the Younger”); however, another version of the letter gives the date as November 23, which seems to be supported by various archeological evidence, including coins that could not have been minted before mid-September. After its destruction, the city’s name and location were forgotten. In 1599, the excavation of an underground channel to divert the Sarno river uncovered walls covered with paintings and inscriptions, including one that mentioned a decurio Pompeii ("the town councillor of Pompeii"); architect Domenico Fontana was summoned, but he had the discoveries covered over again due to their erotic content (such as a fresco depicting the god of sex and fertility, Priapus, and his extremely enlarged penis). Herculaneum, which had been destroyed at the same time, was rediscovered in 1738 by workmen digging for the foundations of a summer palace for Charles of Bourbon (the duke of Parma and Piacenza who at 18 had conquered the kingdoms of Napoli and Sicilia in 1734, becoming Carlo VII of Napoli /Carlo V of Sicilia the following year; in 1759, he became Carlos III of Spain). The Spanish military engineer Rocque Joaquin de Alcubierre, who had overseen the work at Herculaneum, gained funding from the king in 1738 to expand the excavations there. A decade later he began prospecting the site of Pompeii, but after about 1750 he surrendered the project to others due to accusations of mishandling the artifacts. (His approach was essentially treasure hunting, which fostered royal patronage.) He was followed by the Swiss architect/engineer Karl Weber, who carefully excavated entire rooms to preserve their context instead of smashing through frescoed walls. In 1819, when the future king Francesco Iof the Two Sicilies (Regno delle Due Sicili) visited the Pompeii exhibition at the archeological museum in Napoli with his daughter and wife Maria Luisa of Parma (his first cousin, the youngest daughter of Carlos IV of Spain, whom he had married as a widower when she was 13), he was so embarrassed by the erotic artwork that he had it locked away in the gabinetto segreto("secret cabinet"), a gallery in the museum accessible only to "people of mature age and respected morals," which was not permanently reopened until 2000. (Minors still need to be accompanied by a guardian or have written permission.) Giuseppe Fiorelli was in charge of the excavations from 1863 to 1875. Instead of uncovering the streets first, in order to excavate the houses from the ground floor up, he divided the topography of the town into a system of regiones, insulae, and domus and uncovered the houses from the top down in order to preserve everything that was discovered. The objects that lay beneath the ash were preserved because of the lack of air and moisture, but Fiorelli realized that the buried corpses had rotted, leaving a cavity; pouring plaster of Paris into the cavity created a replica of a person at the moment of death.
ReplyDeleteThe town was founded in the 7th or 6th century BCE by the Osci (Oscans) at an important crossroad between Cumae, Nola and Stabiae, and its name was derived from the Oscan “pompe”(five), but the Greeks and Phownicians had already been using it as a safe port. It may have fallen to the Etruscans in the 6th century BCE, and in the 5th century BCE the Samnites conquered it and the rest of Campania. It was captured again by the Greek colony of Cumae between 525 and 474 BCE. The Romans fought three wars against the Samnites (343–341, 326–304, and 298–290 BCE), leading to their conquest of central and southern Italy. Pompeii became a Roman socium but maintained linguistic and administrative autonomy, though Roma had authority to draft its citizens (by the 2nd century BCE, the region was contributing between 1/2 and 2/3 of the republic’s troops). In 91 BCE the tribune Marcus Livius Drusus proposed granting citizenship to the area, but he was assassinated, sparking a rebellion (the Social War). Each of the two Roman consuls initially took command of a theater, but the rebels under Marius Egnatius and others had significant military victories. In 89 BCE, consul Lucius Julius Caesar passed the Lex Julia, which offered full citizenship to the communities that had not revolted, followed by the Lex Plautia Papiria, which enabled inhabitants of rebellious towns to apply for citizenship. At the same time, both consuls went to the northern front and gave Lucius Cornelius Sulla command in the south. Sulla launched a major counter-offensive, including a siege of Pompeii, which was defended by Lucius Cluentius. By 88 BCE, the war was largely over, except in the south. In 80 BCE Pompeii surrendered after the conquest of Nola and became a Roman colony, Colonia Cornelia Veneria Pompeianorum. It became a popular resort town, and by 79 CE it had a population of about 11-15,000 people.
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