Where Left Is Right / The Old Site

From poet David Ray's The Death of Sardanapalus and Other Poems of the Iraq Wars (Howling Dog Press, 2003):

Of Presidents & Emperors

Comparing our imperial leader today to Nero,
whose troops were also engaged in occupation
of Parthian lands along the Euphrates, with about
the same luck as today, we surely must temper
our judgments, forgive a few lies and lives lost,
give thanks that most of the deaths are uncounted,
and not ours. After all, our leader did not murder
his mother. He and she are on excellent terms.

Nero murdered his wife Octavia, also Poppaea,
his second, by kicking her while she was pregnant
with his child, guaranteed divinity. In Washington
you see no such abominations. The lies are genteel
and murder is at the far end of Pathfinders,
Tomahawks, gun ships and Patriot missiles.
Back home we can thank our stars that tribunes
and freed gladiators do not arrive bearing swords
and platters for heads. And because Congress
consists of the deferential they would never be at risk.
Our leader needs not assassinate sassy senators.

He would never set fire to Washington or build
an ostentatious mansion like Nero's over the ruins.
As a God-fearing Christian he would never thank
Jupiter for throwing javelins of fire at his enemies,
nor would he go on tour to read his poems or play
his harp in the provinces. Yet for his speeches
our President gets as much applause as Nero,
whose soldiers prodded those who nodded off.

In the Oval Office no visitor is obliged to fall upon
knees and weary the President's hand with kisses.
Yet the fear Tacitus expressed could be voiced today.
He worried that such "a monotony of disasters"
as those ordered by Nero might, if recited, disgust all
who heard them. He preferred not to sicken his readers
lest they be "fatigued of mind and paralyzed with grief."
In Rome thousands like us could only pray for relief.

As an aside, you know who Sardanapalus (referred to in Ray's book's title) was? He was an Assyrian king, sometimes identified with Assurbanipal (although the facts of the legend don't correspond to the facts we know of Assurbanipal); after two years of war with the Medes, he ordered himself and his court and all his possessions to be burned. Byron wrote a tragedy about the Sardanapalus story, called -- surprise! -- The Death of Sardanapalus. The immolation of the king occurred, in Lord B's imagination, on the banks of the Euphrates.

The painting above, also titled The Death of Sardanapalus, is by Eugène Delacroix, and is based on Byron's play. As you can see, not all of the participants in the king's crazy plan were happy about it. (The painting is available at numerous locations around the Web -- I found this at the Web Gallery of Art.)