Onward march and bear the agony,
to realms immortal,
that thought will now unfailingly relate.
Beyond the sphere that circles most wildly.
Senses all alive, in fragile flesh,
unwanting every want,
altering at every altering thought,
there passes the sigh that leaves my heart.

Cento and Collage Inspired by -
Inferno [canto 2] by Dante Alighieri

I’d reached the edge of the abyss,
Through me you go to the grief-wracked city.
the cavern of grief and pain,
Through me to everlasting pain you go.
out of that quiet into trembling air,
Through me you go and pass amongst lost souls.
rings a peel of endless miseries.

And nothing, where I now arrive, is shining.

Cento and Collage Inspired by -
Inferno [cantos 3-4] by Dante Alighieri

Through this bruised air,
I fell as bodies fall,
for dead and came where light is mute,
a place that moans.
Impelled by storms, surging,
embattled in conflicting squalls.
So, on these breathing gusts the evil souls,
singing lamentations,
trailing all their sorrows.
Come to us and, breathless, speak.

Cento and Collage Inspired by -
Inferno [canto 5] by Dante Alighieri

Wonder at the meaning lying veiled,
turning, through these godless whirls,
beyond the curtain of this alien verse.
Driving wind-impelled through burning air
splinters the branches flat, in clouds of dust.
Musing on words that seemed my enemy.
Plunged in ‘perhapses’,
a shattering resonance charged with panic,
brain arguing ‘yes’ and ‘no’.

Cento and Collage Inspired by -
Inferno [cantos 8-10] by Dante Alighieri

With fear I saw, on every side,
the spirals of great harm.
This way, that way, over dismal rock,
rock, all rock, its color rusted iron.
My eyes searching deep within,
it came, that filthy image of deceit.
Horny demons lashing,
new whips,
new torment
and new tortures.
Dead in the center of that poisoned plain,
stark naked, there were sinners.
Driven by whistling whips,
pain erupted from their eyes.
I was now in the air,
every sight extinguished.
It wheels.
It descends.

Cento and Collage Inspired by -
Inferno [cantos 17-18] by Dante Alighieri

I write this in fear.
This bad dream tore wide
the veil of my future.
Bereft of life and death,
I neither died nor wholly stayed alive.
Words and tears will flow as one,
a public testament to suffering.
Rhymes that rawly rasp
and cackle in keeping with that cacky hole.
They weep.
The soul runs downwards to this sink
to reach the cone’s last core,
where all the weight of everything weighs down.
Truly grief must all proceed from him!
You ill-begotten zombie
deviant, deranged and stuffed
with every sort of vicious canker!
A thick fog breathes
when night ascends once more.
The way is long, towards a shining world,
the road cruelly hard.
Prise off this rigid veil, to clear my eyes.
We once more saw the stars.

Cento and Collage Inspired by -
Inferno [cantos 32-34] by Dante Alighieri