[John Isbell]

Italiano

There is an email headed Italiano
perched in my inbox, where a second reads
Spring Grades Due, a third Greetings. I do not
believe in clutter. And it seems to me
that I can almost picture Italy,
its pigeons and piazzas, in that light
and airy word. I see the olive groves
of childhood with their silver leaves. I see
the narrow streets, and there are car horns honking,
there’s fresh-baked bread. And flooding through my mind
comes Dante’s terza rima, just as bright
as when I bent above the cantiche,
marking each scribbled margin. I recall
proud Farinata rising from his tomb
to greet a fellow Tuscan. And the air
of that warm land, I feel it now. I see
the batch of bread I oversalted, at
ten or eleven, and the baker’s smile;
I see the singing villages, upon
the ridge that is the Apennines, and Rome,
and Naples with its washing and the broad
sweep of the bay. I see the cypresses
and vineyards and the cobblestones. I see
each bright Madonna in her niche, above
the busy throng who speak that dancing tongue.

5.v.2018