I expected to find beauty in Italy, and I did.
I did not expect to find love.
If I ever scoff at love at first sight, ask me this:
do you remember Monday, the 10th of January, 2011?
A strange thing happened to me that day.
Somewhere between Roma Termini and the Church of St. Ignatius, my heart got caught in the tangled streets of Roma.
Its shadow is still there.
I, like Peter Pan with his soap, cannot get that shadow to stick with me, and its absence catches me unexpectedly when I turn in the sunlight.
Me feet, surprised, slip on the ice, and I catch myself, barely, holding my breath while my heart adjusts.
In the early morning,
Italy's folded arms
embraced thick wet blankets.
Before the light stretched down,
her blankets were dark.
She kept secrets in those dim valleys.
In Roma, the facades slipped, and I glimpsed Italy's heart.
An old woman, balancing a big basket on her head, called inside for someone to let her in.
Two businessmen, clad in black coats and striped scarves, spoke quickly but walked slowly.
A line of chattering school-children held hands as their teachers let them to the Pantheon for a field-trip.
Two grey-garbed Dominicans, one tall, one short, strode through traffic to Santa Maria Maggiore.
A white gull perched in the light touching the roof-edge.
Potted geraniums brightened a windowsill.
Laundry dried strung above an alley.
A cat slunk over a railing.
Sunlight caught fountains, obelisks, stone church-fronts.
Dim interiors revealed paintings by men now legendary; statues of angels, saints, prophets, and popes; floor mosaics with classical themes; and clouds of incense floating before crucifixes.
By the River Tiber I sat down and... listened.
I only stood again because the white egret flew over to Trastevera.
Following, I felt my heart pound.
Those narrow cobbled streets, those red, orange, yellow, brown, vine-decorated walls were made by my love.
They echoed his voice to me.
A string symphony soared from an open upstairs window, and for a moment, I could not move.
The city sang to me, played for me, but did no more.
We found an old, old church, my friend and I. No sign announced its name. Its wooden doors were locked. The yard, unmown and unweeded, was strewn by pieces of glass from its broken windows. Its brick front crumbled, worn by weather, vines, and time. Tucked away in Trastevera, this church showed me more of Roma's heart than Santa Maria Sopra Minerva did.
My love deepened.
From Piazzale Guiseppe Garibaldi, all Roma lay before me, from St. Peter's to the Coliseum, and a part of me never left that wall, is still sitting there, forming traceries from ruin to river to basilica to palace...
I weave a tapestry of thought and prayer over my city.
I stood before a fountain,
dipped my fingers in the Trevi, clenched them, and whispered my promise.
In the rush of the water, I caught no reply.
Roma's sound is, underneath, only a waiting silence.
What reply can be given to a promise? - It is only words.
I fell in love, I spoke my love, but my love came not to me.
But I know where he is, and he knows I say I love him.
When I return,
for return I shall,
when I dwell in Roma's seven hills, learn Roma's heart rhythm, get to know Roma's faults, longings, wounds, joys - I will still be in love - more in love - and then, having seen my love is true, my lover will finally show his face.
3 comments:
Beautiful.
If you go back to Rome, I fully expect that we'll have a lovely book of poems from you several years later. It seems to have unlocked a part of your voice I've never heard before.
Suzanne,
I love reading your work. Doesn't matter what its about, it brings tears to my eyes every time. Your words remind me of what it is to feel. They reach deep down inside to the part that I buried; and it whispers back telling me to dig up one more bit of dirt so that eventually it can become a part of me once more. You are a gift. I miss you.
~ Karli
take me with you.
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