Orpheus went to his mother, the muse Calliope, complaining...


Orpheus' complaint


C: Are you here, my son, complaining now again?
O: But what else can I do, my mother, this world being as it is?
C: You must have patience with the mortals.
O: It is not impatience that I suffer from. Your service, mother, is a tribulation,
since I am alone in my outstanding musicality
and therefore mostly sing to deafness and to ignorance of what I sing.
This dull mortality is killing me by their indifference,
which refuses me all feedback and but answers me by shallowness,
vulgarity and unawareness of the worths of truth and beauty.
As immortal in my talent I was even not allowed a wife.
They promised me her if I would perform and sing to all the dead ones,
and I did so, but the dead kept her away from me nevertheless,
and I was not allowed to even see her. Why, then, sing at all if only for the dead,
the deaf and ignorant who can not even keep their promises?
C: My son, life is unfair, I must admit, but you must have more patience
and continue working. That is your responsibility
to art, to beauty and to truth and all humanity.
O: Then let me die a martyr to the coarseness of the ignorant vulgarity of mankind, for their deafness to my worth and beauty as musician kills my music anyway.
C: My son, I'll see what I can do, but don't expect too much.
O: I only want a settlement, because humanity has broken
and refused me any kind of contract.
C: Orpheus, my dear, it grieves me so to see you suffer.
Would you then insist on crucifixion, just to have it done with?
O: Mother, mankind doesn't want me, and they never asked for me.
What can I do, then, but submit a most resounding protest
and efficient demonstration, that will never be forgot in history,
against the inhumanity, intolerance and dullness of this mortal ignorance of man, that forces me out of my job?
C: You are impatient.
O: Art and truth and beauty and the soul must breathe,
or they will suffocate and stifle in impatience.
C: I have heard your prayer, your complaint against the gods is hereby filed,
but you must wait for their decision.
O: For the gods to act you have to wait forever.






Poetry by Christian Lanciai The PoetBay support member heart!
Read 437 times
Written on 2006-10-07 at 12:34

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