Siena

After the race, they shoot the injured horses,
While the air is still alive with joyous cries,
And once again the brilliant banners are furled.
In San Domenico, St Catherine’s head sits
In a golden reliquary, where once the Host
Would fly from the priest’s hand into her mouth,
Honey to the lion, a beam of golden light.
At the fountain on Via dei Rossi, on a wall,
This curious bas-relief catches your eye:
A woman at a window peers at a pomegranate
From behind half-closed curtains; everywhere,
Phantasmagorical caterpillars crawl in profusion,
The smell of ill fate and bad luck in the air.
Through the main portal of the cathedral,
You come: before you, on the marble pavement
Hermes Trismegistus greets you out of Egypt,
Surrounded by ten sibyls, foretelling the day,
And the Wheel of Fortune turns, slowly milling,
While desperate men cling to it for their lives.
Rumble out the chariot, drawn by six white oxen,
Sound the alarum, hoist the battle standard,
Let priests at the altar elevate the Eucharist,
While armies clash on the mount of Armageddon.
The Queen of Heaven presides over the battlefield
Where the Sienese vanquish the Florentines:
Faded fresco crumbling on a palace wall.
The young girl kneeling to take the veil
Holds up bleeding palms, fresh stigmata
With spiral galaxies glimmering through.
Cunning hands draw lots in the stables,
Pestilence rots the hooded faces of friends,
And tribal drums beat their warlike tattoos,
While the adoring artist handles gold leaf.
The horned demon gloats at the city’s ruin,
And the scowling pope hides hell under his robe.