Thanks to the editors at VIA: Voices in Italian Americana who have published my poem, “Song of Naples,” reprinted here below.
SONG OF NAPLES
by Mike Maggio
Awake, O Naples, and tell me of my dream.
Awake at once, O temptress of the Mediterranean,
O love-child of Vesuvius, and reveal the riddle behind this strange
mirage.
Arise and undo this slumbrous spell that beguiles my raptured soul.
Wake up, O Naples, and quench this burning bliss.
Unsing your siren sigh and tell me:
What wonders woo me
to this urgent tryst of space and time.
Is it the gods and goddesses that beckon me,
naked in your marbled gardens, enflamed beneath the molten moon?
Or these ashes of burnt bacchanalias
sealed eternal within your vengeful Vesuvian soil?
O Naples, I have wandered through your jagged streets
brushed against the women who plague the hearts of men.
What delights did I find there!
What feasts to foist upon these unangelic lips!
Satiated, I escaped to your sacred shrines
knelt in your chapels, bowed to your statues and saints.
In the duomo, that center of your sultry soul,
where only God abides the sins of men,
I uncovered your crimson heart, unveiled your somber secrets
buried beneath the rubble of faith and crime
sacrificed on the wretched altars of deceitful men
and I cried out:
What God hides behind these burnished braids of gold!
What redemption! What condemnation!
What retribution
to purify the sins that fester in these weary, persistent pews!
O Naples
wake me from this haunted dream.
Save this shipwrecked stranger, lost in your fallen paradise
and tell me:
what balm you bear to soothe this vagrant soul.
(via: voices in italian americana 36.1 • 61 - 62)
