Once again Carmel Scicluna is keeping the appointment with his readers, this time with the publication of a collection of 86 original poems. The title is ironical and has nothing to do with jasmine nor with the small protagonist in the book.

The major part of these poems have been written during the last three years and are preceded by a short and precise introduction by Prof. Oliver Friggieri, while the poems in the last section are juvenilia, with yet another preface by the same literary critic.

Thanks to poetry, Mr Scicluna intrudes into forbidden territories to point a finger at a truth that should terrify and embarrass us no end, without losing the grip on the controversial element so notorious in his journalistic writings, his novels and his short stories.

For instance, the narrator in the first section Jasmina, recounts in the first or third person singular, all through 30 poems, saying how he had built an intimate relationship with a foreign girl, speaks of his sexual tendencies which are anathema to society, how his relationship with the girl developed and how it came to an end. The obsession of the narrator (married with children) with the Syrian girl, who had been abused by her father when she was 10 years old, introduces the central metaphor of the whole book: the moral degeneration of today’s world.

The second section is built on the initial metaphor. As a matter of fact Pentimento contains seven poems, the themes of which have been inspired by Masonic symbols, the occult, dark rituals, and the enlightened who are nowhere mentioned in international news; all subjects which Scicluna researched meticulously.

The third section is entitled Kribkiebi mill-art and covers 21 poems linked with social, environmental and existential problems. Mr Scicluna imagines the post-modern world as the spittle of a madman hanging on a cliff’s edge, where soap bubbles fly in the air.

The poet is inspired by the first seal of the Apocalypse that has been opened recently by the untainted lamb in a world galvanised by wickedness, which, lacking Light, cannot see the oil-lamp flickering in pitch darkness. Scicluna writes about the sudden arrival of the False Prophet, mentioned in the Revelations of the Holy Scripture, how he is with us and we do not know him, and about the prophecy that soon the world will go through a terrible war, thanks to which the Antichrist will introduce himself as a charismatic person from the East, with a solution for peace. And how all the world will give him credit and will look with awe at the miracles he’ll be performing; and it will believe that he is Christ incarnate!

Other themes are related to this epoch of Horus, and how Europe has managed to subtly erode Christianity with what is soon to occur in our times: the creation of a New Unifying Religion in the name of “the children of God”. How the enlightened will be guiding the leaders of the most powerful countries puppet-like and in the wings, and how they’ll resort to musical videos to deceive the younger generation.

The schism under the carpet of the Catholic Church, while we sing on the praises of the Pope’s “humility”. The world looks on fixedly, a veritable fools’ paradise, gullibly believing all the lies in the news broadcasts, aired by people in the pay of freemasons, and yet the world is happy to continue to keep out and deride the prophets (even the seventh angel) who keep on admonishing it and calling for conversion in the desert. The Second Coming of Christ in his mystic body, which is near. The underground machinations of the Masonic sects to attain absolute world power. Secular humanism with regard to Christianity. The Satanic rituals. And the brutal way small children “vanish” to then be tortured and conditioned to the Monarchic Programme which is also used on beta kittens and puppets of the enlightened such as Lady Gaga and Britney Spears.

These themes are dealt with the poems found in the fourth section, entitled Il-Kalci qieghed ifur.

The last section contains 32 poems, written when the author was still a student at the Faculty of Medicine. These have been chosen and fastidiously edited for this collection and they contain themes not so often heard of.

Scicluna was appointed one of the judges in the National Book Council 2005. He won first prize in the literary contest addressed to the young (2012) with the disturbing manuscript Obsession which, according to one of the judges is written with an exceptional idiom, an almost perfect orthography, a captivating rhythm and is in “a class of its own” as regards adolescent literature appearing to date in the local market.

Jasmina is being donated to the Central Library to be distributed in other public libraries.