A Tour of the Abruzzo

On the beach at Pinetto, in the pine-shade,

We catch the sun on the tips of our tongues,

And pass it back and forth between our mouths,

Trying to forget the frescoes in the Duomo at Atri,

With sea-horses and fish swimming in the light

Of the rose-window, on the floor of the Roman baths

Beneath the apse, with The Slaughter of the Innocents

Before us, the opulent killers going about their work

With calm efficiency, skilled butchers slicing cuts of meat

From children, and holding them up by the ankles

While their mothers weep over the tiny corpses,

And Herod’s officials watch coolly from a balcony.

In Cocullo, on the first Thursday in May,

The people fling snakes at San Domenico’s statue,

Then carry the saint, vipers still clinging

Around him, through the streets in procession,

The crowds rushing forward to touch the serpents
So that they will live long and be happy.

Peregrine falcons patrol the alpine meadows,

And spring stalks the mountains like a wolf.

In grim L’Aquila,as the ninety-nine chimes

Shudder Teutonic night, in the Aurora hotel,

I draw a figure eight on your naked back

In red wine, spread across the smirking bed;

Dawn burns its silver crucifix into my brow

With werewolf frenzy, laughing earthquake of light,

And through the Holy Door of Santa Maria

Sinners pass, absolved in fire at summer’s end.

For several nights I dream the dead of Castel del Monte,

Buried in caves beneath the castle, fully clothed

And seated in cane chairs, as if in conversation.

In the sugar almond afternoon of Sulmona,

We discover dolphins leaping across the mosaic floor

Of Ovid’s Villa, and the barren women coming

To pray to the poet, and touch his stone phallus.