Caligula: A Tyrant Poem by Sheena Blackhall

Gaiusas a child went with his father
Dressed as a soldier, going on campaign
Troops knicknamed him Caligula, "little boots"

He set no value upon human life,
This psychopath, who laughed whilst killing others
Who slept with his three sisters, like the Pharoahs
By incest sought to save his own blood line

Men spread gold coins for him to walk upon
He had a temple built to worship him
A life sized statue of himself within

Here wealthy Romans brought him daily offerings
Peacocks, flamingos, to this cruel god
Called ‘The viper sleeping in Rome's bosom'

He spared his limping uncle Claudius,
To mock, torment and jeer at as he chose
He auctioned away lives of gladiators
Set his own head upon the gods of Rome

This skinny, sickly, balding murderous Caesar
Whose true love was his stallion Incitatus
Gave it a marble stall, an ivory manger

He loved to dress in silk, in womens' dresses
Worejewels and fashionable female shoes
Chariot racing was another passion
Performing songs, and dancing while near nude
Forcing his consuls to become an audience

"Let them hate me, so long as they fear me."
He waged war upon Neptune, Great Sea God,
Ordered his men to lash the ocean waves.
And gather seashells as the spoils of war.

He spent a fortune on two massive barges
To sail on the volcanic Lake Nemi
Afloating temple to Goddess Diana,
The second, a floating palace rigged for vice

Caligula talked to the moon at night
And planned to move from Rome to Alexandria
Shifting the core of power from Italy

A guard called Cassius Chaerea stopped the terror
Stabbing Little Boots by his luxury home
Just as his forebear Gaius Julius Caesar
Had met his bloody death on the flags of Rome

And after, all his statues were demolished
Coins stamped with his head were melted down
And so ended the evil of a monster
Caligula, the deadly tyrant-clown