INFERNO (Cantos 24 & 25) the Thieves: Whatcha Got Is Whatcha Gettin
2005; University of Chicago Press; Volume: 50; Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
2327-5804
Autores Tópico(s)Themes in Literature Analysis
ResumoWhen the year is young, when vain Aquarius washes his mane, when frost copycats its thick-skinned sister snow, the laborer, Joe Blow, with nothing but incentive, slaps his thigh at the white countryside, and returns to his place to pace, like one with nothing better to do but not know what to do, until that time when he looks again with hope, and finds outside has been revived with a lickety-split face-lift and so, lifting his staff, Joe drives his sheep again to graze. Such was my dismay as master's forehead moved from trouble to calm in an eye-blink. We came to a spoiled bridge where the hard leader of me turned with a sweet-fetch. The look of the mountain-foot. He dryly regarded the ruin, took hold of me, prepared to predict my every need, (me, his real summit; he, my houseboy), warning me of splinters, advising, there, clutch; test, go. No road was this for the lead-foot, for even he, slight, and me, body, could barely climb blotch to blotch. Topping off his words with fig-hands raised, the thief cried: Take that god of angel-fish! From that point on I sided with the snakes. One strung him up, a neck-package, saying: No voice for you. While another bound his arms. Riveting him. Prune-collapse. Piss burn down what cannot last. seed-ache. No hell-dark circle kept a spirit more haughty than this. Not even he who fell from the Thebes-wall. For were we not descending, were it not for this slope making our way out simpler than our trip in, I would have been well beaten before the last stone-clash, upon which I sat, vigor of my lungs long past. Sloth, scolded master, atop feathers will bring not fame but a legacy of smoke and lather. Rise hobby-horse soul. Win heavy-body battles. This is not the great test. Capiche? So I shed my lemme-leisure suit with a vigor surreal and not my own, that said, Go. I am strong and daring. Through rock blocks we carved reluctant paths. Me talking while walking so as not to seem sleepy. Then a ditch-voice forked a word discordant. I don't know what it said to me, crossing on the arch above. He fled without speaking another verb. Then a centaur full of flood-rage came calling with a summons: Where, where is sour one? Mommy-Meremma, more snakes than I could count to call his own crowded his back. Atop his shoulder, stumped, a dragon with open wings blackening all it touched. My master said: Meet Cacus who behind the Hollywood sign stirred blood thick as a lake, without his El Camino brothers cruising violent boulevards. His backward-smuggle was uncovered by Hercules, whose sledge-hammer looked at him funny a hundred times. (He felt nothing past nine.) While he spoke, Cacus passed, and three spirits below us, who would've gone unnoticed, cried: Who goes there? by which we stopped our story short-novella- It spoke-moved roughly. I turned my eye-life down, but found no fount but gloom. So I asked Master if we could descend to the cinched because I hear what is not intended and see what is not there. To which master-bell chimed, An honest demand will be met with hushed deed. We followed the bridge down to the eighth bank. The bulge took shape. Snake-fright. …
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