[Brian Allgar]

Here's an odd one - shades of Browning? I've invented a couple of details, but it's basically true. And what amazing music he wrote!

The rules of love? Good Sir, my wife betrayed me -
Yes, me, Gesualdo da Venosa, Prince,
And Count of Conza. She most foully played me,
So love’s a subject I’ve abandoned since.

Her lover I dispatched by sword and gun;
On her, I used a well-honed hunting-knife,
And when I saw that she was not quite done,
I slit the throat of my adulterous wife.

My only solace was my composition,
My madrigals, my sacred Tenebrae,
For music counteracts the soul’s attrition,
And, through the darkness, brings a glimpse of day.

My love-life, I confess, has been dramatic;
Perhaps that’s why my music’s so chromatic.