'The Blameless Life'

How pleasing to learn that friends, seemingly unknown to each other -- compartmentalized as friendships often are -- intersected before we knew either of them. Sixteen years ago today, the late D.G. Myers published on his Commonplace Blog thirteen epigrams written more than twenty-five years earlier. I had no idea David had written poetry. The publisher of the 1984 chapbook A Patch of Weeds was R.L. Barth. The poems suggested how much the two writers had in common, besides a tartly satirical voice and a taste for epigrams – Martial, J.V. Cunningham, Dr. Johnson, Robert Herrick. Here’s is David’s rendering of Martial’s 3.71: “I know, yes. How? I didn’t read your mind. He’s sore between the legs and you, behind.” And here is Bob’s version of the same poem, included in his recently published Pleasing the Diners: Translations from the Latin of Martial (Contubernales Books, 2026): “Naevolus, your boy’s ass is sore; your prick is too. Although I am no seer, I know just what you do.” Here is…