Panem Et Circenses (Bread And Circuses) Poem by Goddo Faggotte

The Baths are smoothly curved, as cool as cream,
like deeply dimpled virgins of vestal antiquity.
Outside lies the ceramic city, coldly glazed and sharply tiled,
menaced in the emptiness by gladiator-gangsters,
shadowed in the marble blue light
of another darkly cold night.

The architecture stands in solemn columns,
listening still to the whispered old complaints
and longings of ordinary people,
like The Colosseum when the circus bread
soured to mouldy green.

A feral, wolf-boy caught a crimson-combed cockerel, thrice crowing, spurring and sparring with the moon-shadow of its captor, as the august Caesar struggled to his brutal end.

He plays the part:
“This is the age of the Last Ludi
and I am the Great Auger of this Eternal City.
Ave, Imperator, morituri te salutant. ”
Holding the frantic bird to the heavens,
the feathered neck is rung and entrails spilt.

The spirit-mounted torches of our souls
stand exposed to the howls of Visigoths.
Our blood curdles, hiding in the shadows
of The Palatine Hill,
for our protectors and patricians have long fled.
Soon Vandals will be climbing and clawing at the gates of The Old City
and we will be lost.

All circuses end in death and a return to hunger.