Caligula - Little Boots

Little Boots... That is what they called him. A boy raised in Soldier Camps... Mascot Prince in blood-soaked leather. Gaius Caesar Germanicus... Caligula. Rome sighed with relief. The old cruelty buried... The trials undone... The exiles returned... Hope draped herself in white marble. But marble cracks. He came smiling with Imperial Teeth Young Beautiful Beloved The Treasury fat with Tiberius Gold waiting Rome thought— ah... a kinder monster But fever entered his bloodstream or poison or lightning or madness with a Roman Name And when he rose from illness— something else wore his face. The Moon kissed the Emperor strange... The mirrors stopped answering his name... I AM GOD IN GOLD LEAF I AM THUNDER IN SILK Bow before the trembling Boy King whose pulse sounds like War Drums Sisters crowned in fever Drusilla burning into Heaven Empire built from appetite Empire built from appetite ROME— DO YOU LOVE ME NOW? He squandered Kingdoms on spectacle Wine Perfume Blood Citizens stripped of Estates Noble throats squeezed for coin Gaul bent under plunder The Rhine learned obedience Lepidus fell Gaetulicus fell All betrayal wears a familiar face And then— the Ocean. Oh darling. The Ocean. He declared war on Neptune himself Marched soldiers to the Northern Edge of the World Steel ready standards raised Imperial thunder Then— “Collect seashells.” Spoils of the conquered Sea. Madness can be exquisitely dressed. Jerusalem trembled “Raise my statue in the Sacred Temple” A God demands architecture A mortal demands applause Herod whispers diplomacy into catastrophe History exhales— not yet Incitatus... Sweet horse... Golden oats Marble stable Silken blankets “Perhaps Consul,” he mused And Rome laughed nervously because Tyrants sometimes joke and sometimes do not He kissed Divinity with his own mouth Named himself Immortal Wanted Dynasties like Egyptian Gods Brother-sister crowns Ptolemaic fantasies incest wrapped in incense Drusilla dead— consecrated Divine. The first Roman woman lifted into Heaven by grief. Or vanity. Or obsession. Twenty-eight years old... Four years to rot an Empire— Praetorians watching... Senators sharpening silence— The crowd grows tired— THE GOD BLEEDS LIKE ANY MAN— ROME HAS HAD ENOUGH Cassius Chaerea Cornelius Sabinus Steel beneath the Palatine laughter Daggers between applause The Games continue while Emperors fall No God survives the corridor No silk stops iron No Seashell Army saves a Tyrant ROME— YOUR LITTLE BOOTS ARE RED. Caesonia... dead. The child... dead. And somewhere— the Sea still keeps its shells.