Caesar delivers the original
Riviera at the estimated expense
of one million dead among mere Gauls.
Posting on X ‘To Connaught or to Hell,’
a people-taming Force of Heaven cleanses
of reprobates our sodden-with-rain Riviera.
Rivieras on the Volga fill the brochure
Mein Kampf. The Congo is the heart of darkness,
so too the Putamayo. Wealth is blind:
investors picture them as new Rivieras.
No one steps in the same Riviera twice
or forever. All come undocumented,
all huddle on the Stygian Riviera.
In longing for the further shore, we stretch
our arms out. One who is not a dealer, this loser
from Galilee or Gaza, with his take
on money-changers, with his wounds, is there:
his gaze of mercy our one remaining hope.
Philip McDonagh is adjunct professor in the faculty of humanities at Dublin City University and director of the Centre for Religion, Human Values, and International Relations. His published poetry includes Memories of an Ionian Diplomat (Ravi Dayal, New Delhi), The Song the Oriole Sang (Dedalus Press), and Gondla, or the Salvation of the Wolves (Arlen House).
Riviera at the estimated expense
of one million dead among mere Gauls.
Posting on X ‘To Connaught or to Hell,’
a people-taming Force of Heaven cleanses
of reprobates our sodden-with-rain Riviera.
Rivieras on the Volga fill the brochure
Mein Kampf. The Congo is the heart of darkness,
so too the Putamayo. Wealth is blind:
investors picture them as new Rivieras.
No one steps in the same Riviera twice
or forever. All come undocumented,
all huddle on the Stygian Riviera.
In longing for the further shore, we stretch
our arms out. One who is not a dealer, this loser
from Galilee or Gaza, with his take
on money-changers, with his wounds, is there:
his gaze of mercy our one remaining hope.
Philip McDonagh is adjunct professor in the faculty of humanities at Dublin City University and director of the Centre for Religion, Human Values, and International Relations. His published poetry includes Memories of an Ionian Diplomat (Ravi Dayal, New Delhi), The Song the Oriole Sang (Dedalus Press), and Gondla, or the Salvation of the Wolves (Arlen House).
