Critics & Criticism
A Poem by A. V. Marraccini
We have declared love to be vestigial; We have made our upper lips stiff cordons. We shuck every oyster with a ritual, That to each, a pearl is so apportioned. We told Truth that she was an easy lay; In the third person we took up baccarat, And only someone else’s fortune play Out on the felted tables, the patois Of the comfortable only ceasing When having slipped her blindfold’s knot, Justice takes the player’s throat releasing The jugular only at this upshot: Chips all in, Critic, bet your bleating heart, The stakes were always this: always thus, the art.






I've been translating Petrarch all day. This sonnet feels like a personal treat for my efforts.
absolutely love it.