Canto XIV Project Dante

It came to me last night how to maintain a structure with the poem. It has to have a structure more solid. I realized that the ideas of threes can back into it so I have a couple of options. I think what I may end up doing is making each canto of 90 lines, multiply that up by 34 cantos and you get just over three thousand lines. Now I could just rewrite a little here and there or I could make a proper 3 lines per stanza kind of thing happen. Hmmmm, the temptation is for the easier path but since both lead round a cliff I may be wrong either way.

In the meantime heres what I wrote on canto XIV, fairly easy process, started friday morning over coffee and cigarettes, went to work and stayed busy until about 3pm, signed off and got down to work, mostly finished (up to line - 76 ) by 10pm last night.

So led was I to Great Divide 1
The burning sands by God devised
And out upon this dreadful plain
I saw a million fires rain 4
Upon those souls that sinned below
That dared attack the golden throne
In seventh maw third circle round
The souls of others foul be found 8
The fires burned like napalm dropped
On driest thatch or parched crops
In darkest gloom the only light
Was from these burning fires bright 12
As sinners blazed and rolled on sand
To douse what can't be doused by damned
So Virgil turns and leads the way
Not out on burning sand we stray 16
Where flames came down like burning rafts
Maintained by Hell's infernal craft
But rather yet we hold the cleft
And skirt the wood we'd recent left 20
I saw a sinner bound to sand
With metal rings on feet and hands
And screamed he of his hate for God
He called a fake, a foul, a fraud 24
The sins of man of which he screamed
Foul blasphemy the curses streamed
And seeing then us walking past
Aspersions on me then were cast 28
'There is no god, you're foolish eyes
Can't see whats best described as lies
These burning sands before you see
The punishment for impiety 32
The forest round it ringed with thorns
For sinners who first life have scorned
The river red of sadness bled
Whereby you simply must have tread 36
And burning graves for heretics
Beyond that flows the River Styx
Upon whose banks the greedy ranks
Must push their penance round then back 40
Beyond again the stinking rain
Where gluttons starving cry in vain
Now up to second circle round
Where lustful souls like starlings found 44
Then through the mist for those who missed
The chance to get the Saviors kiss
Beyond again where cowards quake
By Acheron before the gate 48
Include so do the world beyond
Its in your mind, do not respond
And God is just a foolish dream!'
In rage to me this sinner screamed 52
So turns then Virgil to his right
And leads he round the land of blight
And reach we then a rocky course
Where river red poured through in force 56
And tale he told of Man of Crete
A statue great and most complete
Whose head was poured from purest gold
His arms and chest from silver rolled 60
The rest of him down to his balls
From Iron made if I recall
His legs were bronze, his left foot too
His right is baked from clay mind you 64
Upon the foot of clay he leans
While tears fall down in bloody streams
That forms the rivers we traverse
In buddy movie most adverse 68
For sins of world the statue cries
And all the rivers could run dry
Before they'd dent the blood thats spent
That pour through Hell for no repent 72
And Amazon one billionth piece
Of liquid flowing through this crease
So time had come for us to quit
And out on plain of fire split 76

So thats the first run through. I think I know where and how I can get the 14 lines to make an even 90 if my new structure is to work. Right now I'm moving straight on. I'll do a basic run through which will be as long as it is, and then after that as a revision process I'll start to fill in the gaps and trim/organize/rearrange kind of thing.

The total line count with 34 cantos and 90 lines per canto will be 3060. A nice round number.

I'm going to try to run through canto XIII one time here, probably not all the way through. Theres a large section on the end that deals with two squanderers who are chased into scene by a pack of dogs. I'm thinking that they might be Hendrix and Joplin who both performed at Woodstock. Woodstock, get it? I laughed out loud I did.

I've been working on this post for about four days now. I can almost feel the shape of the end of the canto in my mind, but the words are still unclear. If I could dedicate a day to getting it right I think I could get it done. Wee, thats what the weekend is for.

Okay, this is a breakdown of the writing order of the canto. Lines 1-44 were completed on the 4th of Nov, lines 45-68 were written between the 5th and the 8th and all lines following (69-
) were written on the 9th. When I did a line count it was already fairly big (70+ lines) so the end became kind of condensed, or at least more so than the original idea I had for the end of this canto.

Anyway, I'm glad its done, it'll need to be redone, but at least I got through it in one (sic: cohesive) piece.

Project Dante

Canto XIII

So entered we this forest black 1
Its colors wrong, all out of whack
And Nessus left us find our way
In pathless wood in fear we strayed 4
And all my clothes on briar's torn
All shredded they on curving thorns
And up on top of branches gnarled
There nested Harpies, down they snarled 8
From high on top of highest boughs
I watched them with my twisted brow
Their eyes were cold, with wings so wide
They screamed as heard I round me sighs 12
With dreadful moan that echoes round
The sad lament of hopeless sound
So Virgil turns to say right there
In words that died in stagnant air 16
That we had entered second ring
That Phlegathon around did pin
That stretched on to the burning sands
(Where blasphemous by God were canned.) 20
'Behold this wood and listen now
For source of this infernal row
Just grab a branch and snap it off
To put to rest that train of thought 24
So grabbed I branch and off I tear
And heard I then a pain filled swear
'Oh Cruel-ty, without pity!
Oh why must you most cruel wound me? 28
What once was man but now are stumps
Just flotsam in this forest dumped
For those who have the souls of snakes
Now down in seventh circle staked.' 32
From out of wound there came a voice
Of those who made a bitter choice
'Forgive me please.' my master grieved
To set this wretch upon your tree 36
So tell this fool who once you were
Your name on earth he may repair.'
And so in wood of suicide
I heard a tale that made me cry 40
Of servant who had served his lord
On shifting sands, by act of sword
Then came one day and I was framed
And took my life for sense of shame 44
And ever if you see my master
When you leave this foul disaster
Tell him then of all you know
My self slain soul in hell now sown.' 48
And told him not I seen his boss
A mile before the river cross
Where rested he up to his brows
In burning blood in fate most foul 52
'Now tell him how you can to be,'
My master speaks to moaning tree,
'In second round of seventh maw
And what your dying vision saw.' 56
'I saw a light.' The tree replied
'When first I'd realized I'd died
And then a wind began to blow
That pulled me in on current slow 60
Until it like Katrina blasts
That sucked me down and then was cast
By chance wherever happened fell
On dreadful slopes of seventh hell 64
And when the final day last comes
We'll suffer still with bodies hung
That once we wore, but wear no more
Instead upon our limbs we'll store 68
And hang they then like rotten fruit
Reminder of a dreadful truth
That One should never Oneself kill
Or risk your soul in forest chill.' 72
Before the bush could say some more
We heard a growing distant roar
Then a sudden ground starts shaking
Heard I sounds of branches breaking 76
Sees I two I thought I knew
Come running in with asses blue
Followed by a hundred bitches 79
One of them in pain down pitches 80
And cries he then to fleeing mate
Before by pack of dogs was ate
'You weren't so fast at Nuremberg!'
And then was caught by chasing curs 84
And gobbled up and carried off 85
This sinner by the pack was scoffed
Half a hundred hounds all straying
All the while make dreadful baying 88
Run they off with little pieces
Splattered on their midnight fleeces 90
Heard I low then pain filled moaning
Crept I closer to the groaning
To where I saw a broken bush
That bleeding from it phrases gushed 94
'I am the ghost of Kurt Cobain
By mine own hand was I self slain
Now in this bleeding bush I'm bind
Oh well, whatever, nevermind.' 98
Then Virgil takes my hand and leads
Beyond the wood of tree that bleed
As tears now roll from wounded eye
In silence stumbled as I cried 102

BEHODL thee MINO-TOR

Moved the Minotaur sketch over to a new canvas with the same dimensions as the finished book. Painted in a quick rocky setting.

Just working on some sketches for the wood of the suicides in canto XIII. The idea is that their souls are thrown into the seventh maw and they take root wherever they fall. On the final day of judgment they would retrieve their bodies but not be allowed to wear them. Because they had thrown away the gift of life they would be forced instead to hang their former flesh from their branches for eternity.

Lovely.

I think I may have the bodies hanging from the trees along with the harpies. I can add a line to the canto so Dante thinks them pieces of fruit.

What a maroon.