April 8

Firenze

the moon was slung like a cat’s claw
scooped the earlier crack of calcio storico
the canons
the roar and blood
and ladled it all
quivering
into the Arno

Santa Croce, le scale
and Signore Alighieri
an overdressed
unamused
writer
who pretended not to notice
things blooming
not the bruises
nor the heat
not even the fireworks
that lightening flowered the river

but he saw, he saw:
he fell once and she a thousand times more