‘Byron Swims the Hellespont’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society August 6, 2022 Beauty, Culture, Poetry 39 Comments . Byron Swims the Hellespont On May 9, 1810, Lord Byron swam across the Hellespont from Sestos to Abydos to duplicate the legendary back-and-forth...
‘Creativity, Originality, and Eccentricity’: An Essay by Joseph S. Salemi The Society July 22, 2022 Essays, Poetry, Shakespeare 35 Comments . Creativity, Originality, and Eccentricity by Joseph S. Salemi I don’t know why it should be so, but I have a propensity to attract the attention...
A Translation of Horace’s Barine Ode, by Joseph S. Salemi The Society July 11, 2022 Culture, Love Poems, Poetry, Sapphic Verse, Translation 20 Comments . Quintus Horatius Flaccus, Odes, II.8 “The first thing we learn about Barine is that she is in the habit of making and breaking promises (of love...
‘A Glass for My Father’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society June 19, 2022 Blank Verse, Culture, Poetry 20 Comments . A Glass for My Father Marie-Maurille de Virot, Mademoiselle de Sombreuil (February 14, 1768—May 15, 1823) My father was the Marquis de...
‘Three Poems on Problems’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society June 4, 2022 Culture, Poetry 26 Comments . Servant of the Servants of God Servus Servorum Dei —a title of the Pope A small informal gathering of clergy From satin cassocks down to the...
‘Satan’s Limericks on the Seven Deadly Sins’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society May 15, 2022 Culture, Humor, Limerick, Poetry 19 Comments . Satan’s Limericks on the Seven Deadly Sins Sepulchrum patens est guttur eorum; linguis suis dolose agebant: venenum aspidum sub labiis...
‘Crank Out a Few, Please’: Observations on Poetic Composition by Joseph S. Salemi The Society May 3, 2022 Essays, For Educators, Poetry 22 Comments . Crank Out a Few, Please by Joseph S. Salemi Many years ago, when I was in graduate school, I attended a seminar on Vergil’s Eclogues. These are...
‘A Clamshell in Concrete’ (and a Short Note) by Joseph S. Salemi The Society April 8, 2022 Beauty, Blank Verse, Essays, Poetry 24 Comments . A Clamshell in Concrete I was a child in kindergarten class. My mother held my hand as we trod on The sidewalk leading to the boulevard. This was...
Three Poems on Language by Joseph S. Salemi The Society March 28, 2022 Beauty, Blank Verse, Culture, Poetry 20 Comments . The Hypodermic For a poet, the pen is merely part Of the apparatus of addiction. He emulates the frozen fly in amber Watching eons come, roll by,...
A Poem on the Proverbial Uptight Librarian, by Joseph S. Salemi The Society March 5, 2022 Humor, Poetry 32 Comments . Prudence Huntleigh, Head Librarian theme of “the proverbial uptight librarian” suggested by Brian Yapko She mans the front desk and she...
A Valentine: ‘To a Girl Named Olivia’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society February 13, 2022 Beauty, Blank Verse, Love Poems, Poetry 19 Comments . To a Girl Named Olivia What shall I say to you of untold love In this more than empty space that lies between Our two selves wound in tongue-tied...
‘The Crucifixion of the Serpent’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society February 8, 2022 Blank Verse, Culture, Poetry 17 Comments . The Crucifixion of the Serpent And Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it upon a pole, and it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any...
Three Poems on Religion (with a short note) by Joseph S. Salemi The Society January 20, 2022 Beauty, Blank Verse, Culture, Poetry 13 Comments . Apocalypse The fractured sky splits, flaming at the edge— The earth heaves upwards in explosive wrath. No eye can bear the clay-caked risen...
Poetic Pitfalls: An Essay by Joseph S. Salemi The Society January 5, 2022 Essays, For Educators, Poetry 18 Comments . There are a number of ways to go wrong in poetry. Unfortunately, the Poetry Establishment is only willing to admit the existence of a select few...
‘Twelve Chaucerian Limericks’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society December 20, 2021 Culture, Humor, Limerick, Poetry 19 Comments . Twelve Chaucerian Limericks for Paul Freeman Some pilgrims went riding to Kent, And here’s how the journey was spent: As they traipsed through...
‘What Foo Dogs Can Teach Us’: An Essay by Joseph S. Salemi The Society November 26, 2021 Beauty, Culture, Essays, Poetry 19 Comments . Many years ago I gave a talk at a scholarly conference at Queens College, C.U.N.Y. My section of the conference was dedicated to contemporary...
A Poem for Kyle Rittenhouse: ‘Don’t Tread on Me’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society November 20, 2021 Culture, Poetry 18 Comments . Don’t Tread on Me For Kyle Rittenhouse, acquitted on November 19, the feast day of St. Elizabeth of Hungary, patroness of the falsely...
‘Biden Has an Accident at the Vatican’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society November 9, 2021 Culture, Humor, Poetry 15 Comments . Biden Has an Accident at the Vatican Ubi Petrus, ibi Ecclesia: Where Peter is, there is the Church. Ubi Bergoglius, ibi merda: Where Bergoglio is,...
‘Let’s Go, Brandon…’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society November 4, 2021 Culture, Humor, Poetry 22 Comments . "Let's Go Brandon" People don’t want to say “F--k” When dealing with President Schmuck. So they say “Let’s go, Brandon” instead To a...
‘The Asinine Armoress: Hannah Gutierrez Reed’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society October 28, 2021 Culture, Humor, Poetry 7 Comments . To all the tough women in Texas who actually know how to handle guns. My daddy got the job for me. He wanted me to work. And daddy’s got a lot of...
‘Pope Sylvester II and Meridiana’ by Joseph S. Salemi (and an Essay on Dramatic Monologues) The Society October 24, 2021 Culture, Essays, Humor, Poetry 11 Comments . Pope Sylvester II and Meridiana Pope Sylvester II, born Gerbert de Aurillac (946-1003), is said to have had a demonic succubus named Meridiana who...
Three Sonnets on Contemporary Poetry, by Joseph S. Salemi The Society October 8, 2021 Culture, Humor, Poetry 25 Comments . Prerequisites for a Trendy Poetry Reading Casual clothes, streetwise but debonair: Knit sweater, denims (slightly dishabille); A tentative,...
A Major Problem: An Essay by Joseph S. Salemi The Society August 27, 2021 Culture, Essays, Poetry 89 Comments . "American pragmatism insists that words are for use, not enjoyment; American puritanism insists that expression is a duty, not a pleasure."...
‘Pierrepoint on Capital Punishment’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society August 17, 2021 Blank Verse, Culture, Poetry 19 Comments . Albert Pierrrepoint (1905-1992) served as one of GreatBritain’s chief executioners from 1931 to 1956, duringwhich time he hanged over 500...
When Poetry Matters, and When It Doesn’t: An Essay by Joseph S. Salemi The Society July 27, 2021 Culture, Essays, Poetry 59 Comments . A widespread distemper in modern life is the insistent need that many people feel to justify themselves and their activities. Countless persons...
Two Mythological Poems by Joseph S. Salemi The Society July 19, 2021 Beauty, Blank Verse, Culture, Humor, Poetry 13 Comments . Heliotrope Phaeton, son of the god Helios, attempted to drive his father’s celestial chariot. His inexperience caused him to burn up part of the...
‘The Carnelian Ring: A Still-Life’ by Joseph S. Salemi, and ‘A Note on the Objective Correlative’ The Society June 29, 2021 Art, Beauty, Blank Verse, Essays, Poetry 11 Comments . The Carnelian Ring: A Still-Life Footfalls echo in the memoryDown the passage which we did not takeTowards the door we never openedInto the...
The Perils of “Perfection”: An Essay by Joseph S. Salemi The Society June 12, 2021 Essays, Poetry 40 Comments . Persons devoted to formal, metrical poetry are susceptible to a specific disease, much in the same way as light-skinned persons are apt to get bad...
‘Épuration’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society June 2, 2021 Beauty, Culture, Poetry 14 Comments . On the Greek isle of Tilos are the ruins of the sanctuary of Pythian Apollo. Over them has been built the Church of the Archangel Michael. "Now rot...
Two Poems about Stone, by Joseph S. Salemi The Society May 19, 2021 Beauty, Blank Verse, Culture, Poetry 17 Comments . Isolde and the Men of Stone Who could believe, except on ancient trust? The stones grew pliant, yielding into shape When softer nature touched...
‘Precious Procedure and Process’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society May 9, 2021 Essays, Poetry 55 Comments . When I was eighteen years old, something happened that had a profound effect on my view of the world. Next door to us in Woodside there lived an...
A Translation of François Villon’s ‘Ballade of Prayer to Our Lady,’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society April 5, 2021 Acrostic, Beauty, Culture, Poetry, Translation 11 Comments . Ballade of Prayer to Our Lady (in the voice of the poet’s mother) by François Villon (1431-1463), from French by Joseph S. Salemi Lady of...
‘Easter!’: Translation of an Italian Sonnet by Joseph S. Salemi The Society April 4, 2021 Culture, Poetry, Translation 13 Comments . Easter! by Rosario Previti (1882-1967), from Italian by Joseph S. Salemi Why your bitter torment on the cross, Martyr of Golgotha, if the world on...
Two More Poems with ‘Conceits’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society March 27, 2021 Beauty, Blank Verse, Essays, Humor, Poetry, Poetry Forms 10 Comments . The Bibliophile’s Birth Certificate Marius Michel (1846-1925) was one of the most prominent and gifted bookbinders in France. He produced work in...
‘Pain, Product, and Poetry’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society March 22, 2021 Essays, Poetry 24 Comments I went to my first opera when I was six years old. My mother took me to the world premiere of Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Saint of Bleecker Street, on...
‘The Wife’s Lament’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society February 14, 2021 Humor, Love Poems, Poetry 11 Comments . For my friend Rose R., with sincere condolences. Good Lord, imagine my bad luck: I’m married to a hockey puck. I don’t know how it came...
‘Maurras at the Parthenon (Acropolis, 1896)’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society February 4, 2021 Beauty, Blank Verse, Culture, Poetry 11 Comments . Charles Maurras (1868-1952) was a highly influential French poet, essayist, and political journalist. He edited the rightist paper Action...
Two Poems on Benvenuto Cellini, by Joseph S. Salemi The Society January 13, 2021 Art, Beauty, Culture, Ekphrastic, Humor, Poetry 17 Comments . Benvenuto Cellini’s Salt-Cellar A woman sitting back, just mildly curious To hear a man’s contrived, seductive patter, Waiting to see what...
Two Poems Making Use of ‘Conceits,’ by Joseph S. Salemi The Society January 9, 2021 Beauty, Blank Verse, Culture, Essays, Poetry 26 Comments . The Death of Today’s Sequoia Flecte ramos, arbor alta, tensa laxa viscera: Et rigor lentescat ille, quem dedit nativitas, Ut superni membra...
The Struggle for the Formalist Tradition: An Essay by Joseph S. Salemi The Society December 13, 2020 Deconstructing Communism, Essays, For Educators, Poetry 58 Comments Why are many young persons so bad at writing formal poetry? Why do they struggle and labor and twist and turn when trying to compose formal...
