The Baci Sestinas

Baci is the Italian word for kisses (singular: bacio), but Baci is also a kind of chocolate truffle topped with a hazelnut, and inside the wrapper are these love quotes. I began collecting them and have been using them as the inspiration point for most of the sestinas in the collection.


For those of you who don't know, a sestina, is a seven stanza poem that follows complicated pattern where the concluding word of each line in the first stanza is repeated and carried throughout the entire poem, illustrated below.

1. ABCDEF
2. FAEBDC
3. CFDABE
4. ECBFAD
5. DEACFB
6. BDFECA
7. (envoi) ECA or ACE

The envoi, also known as tornada, includes all six of the recurring words.

Now, I generally follow a pretty strict syllabic count, but my tornada doesn't exactly follow the usual pattern.

Below is a list of all the quotes I've used so far. Ones marked open haven't been used yet, actually, while some have been used a couple of times.

Bacio n. un-numbered
"Love is a desire that wells up from the heart excess if liking."
Jacopo de Lentini

Bacio n. 90
“I loved you at first sight. And you smile because you know it.”
A. Boito

Bacio n. 84
“Doubt thou the stars are fire… but never doubt my love.”
W. Shakespeare

Bacio n. 75
“The truth of friendship is as sacred to me
as the sanctity of a lifelong marriage”
K. Mansfield

Bacio n. 62
"A friend to all is a friend of none."
A. Schopenhauer

Bacio n. 39
“The sound of a kiss is not so loud as that of a cannon, but its echo lasts a great deal longer.”
O.W. Holmes

Bacio n. 38
"A forbidden kiss burns hotter than fire."
Anonymous

Bacio n. 30
“A kiss is the sweet prize, long sought after.”
Anonimos

Bacio n. 20
“Love is a spontaneous grass, not a garden plant.”
I. Nievo

Baci n. 138
“Loved shall be who lovable becomes.”
Proverb

Bacio n. 13
"There is only one happiness in life: To love and be loved."
G. Sand

Bacio n. 109(rewrite)
"Being a woman is a terribly difficult task, since it
consists principally in dealing with men."
Conrad

Bacio n. 108
“The woman does not exist of whose beauty all men shall agree upon.”
G. Leopardi

Bacio n. 107(rewrite)
“If God had not created woman, he would not have created flowers.”
V. Hugo

Bacio n. 8
“Passion colours everything it touches.”
B. Gracián

Bacio n. 04
"Love is a storm of pleasure, and an enchantment of sweetness"
Anonimo

Bacio n. 53
“Love is blind to faults, friendship loves them.”
Anonimo

Bacio n. 03
“To love a person is to learn the song that is in their heart.”
Anonimo

Bacio n. 85(open)
Love me because without you I can do nothing. I am nothing”
P. Verlaine

Bacio n. 79(open)
“Love me when I deserve it least, as that is when I'll need it most.”
Anonimo.”

Bacio n. 07
Til I loved, I did not live enough.”
E. Dickinson

Bacio n. 77
“Last night love entered my dreams... and then it was morning.”
Anonimo

Bacio n. 63
“Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.”
W. Shakespeare

Bacio n. 68(open)
“A true friend knows all there is to know about you yet still likes you.”
E. Hubbard

Bacio n. 83
“Grow old along with me, the best is yet to be”
G. Sand

Bacio n. 104(open)
“Never trust a woman who tells you her real age;A woman who tells you that would tell you anything.”
O. Wilde

Bacio n. 89(open)
“Come, lay thy head upon my breast, And I will kiss thee into rest.”
G. Byron

Bacio n. 16(open)
“In love, silence is of more avail than speech.”
B. Pascal

Bacio n. 140
“We know least about those we love the most.”
Proverbio cinese

Bacio n. 45
“A kiss strikes like lightening; love passes like a storm.”
Proverbio arabo

Bacio n. 42
“With your kisses I have painted my starry sky.”
Anonimo

Bacio n. 93(open)
“Oh truly love! Oh mummur words of fire!”
J. Keats

Bacio n. 142
“The longer the cord, the higher the kite flies.”
Proverbio francese

Bacio n. 117(open)
“The ideal husband is unmarried”
O. Wilde

Bacio n. 95
“Love has made me live love ardently.”
G. Stampa

Bacio n. 55(open)
“Friends are those rare people who ask how you are and then wait to hear the answer.”
Anonimo

Bacio n. 100
“Launch your heart before you and run after it.”
Proverbio arabo

Bacio n. 17
Love is like luck: it doesn't like to be chased.”
T. Gautier

Bacio n. 150
“Learning not to love others lends to not loving oneself any longer.”
Anonimo

Bacio n. 119(open)
“Woman: You don't understand me. Man: What do you mean?”
Anonimo

Bacio n. 69
"You can judge a man by his friends.”
G. Flaubert

Non-Bacio 1
"Love is only known by him who hopelessly persists in love.”
F. von Schiller

Non-Bacio 2
“Love and joy are incredibly habit forming; often a single exposure is enough to cause permanent addiction.”
J. Brunner

No comments:

Post a Comment