The obsession continues

Il-kalci qieghed ifur

Some time ago, I had reviewed for these pages Carmel Scicluna’s Ossessjoni. In this book of poems I am reviewing today we find, at least in the first part, the same theme of a grownup man’s obsession with a 10year-old Syrian girl which he rescues from her tyrant father.

In some ways, the novel provides more background and contest. Here, in this book, however, things get more graphic. The girl is described as “nuda” almost every time she is mentioned and the man’s inner thoughts become more and more explicit.

There is a stream in the world’s literature that is deeply erotic so an experienced traveller is not unduly fazed by this. Even so, in this age where everybody lets everything hang out, there is or should be a line that separates freedom of speech from what would otherwise constitute a criminal act.

The other part of the book contains poems on other subjects. The subject matter takes on various forms, from ancient esoterism to apocalyptic phantasies on the present Pope as a “false prophet”.

Scicluna’s word creation is always lovely to read. He has a way of either inventing new meanings for used words or else creating new words from ordinary words.

This book also allows him to show us his range of reading and cultural knowledge, quoting or referring at various times to Samuel Becket, Rilke, Hans Bellmer, and to artists such as Picasso, Leonardo or Goya. It is, in its way, a remarkable tour de force.