Mario Petrucci is one of the most dynamic and original poets writing in English. Shrapnel and Sheets (Headland) and Heavy Water: a poem for Chernobyl (Enitharmon) both received national acclaim, including a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and the Daily Telegraph/Arvon Prize. Petrucci’s commitment to a formal versatility and inventiveness appropriate to the ethical and spiritual substance of his work has few, if any, parallels today, and has won him many admirers. No one is better equipped to present Catullus to the modern reader: the Roman poet’s urgency, wit and bite find here equivalents possessing all of the power and ribald energy of their famous originals.
48
Honey – when it comes to kissing
we’d out-score Juventus. That goal
of love is in your eyes! Let’s play
at Love – season upon season – until
the very leagues expire. I’ll not tire
or wilt in extra time – even though
our sum of embraces (that endless
slurp of lips played out on night’s
sweet pitch!) out-numbers the crowd
on four sides: those eavesdropping
fields with all their ears of corn.