Journal of Italian Translation - Brooklyn College - Academic Home ...

other cars’ headlights add to my unease
sound of the car wheels on wet asphalt
consumed not knowing if dawn will return
now lady I have your hand in mine
I know the anesthesia goes deep down
in the vortex with my eyes sealed shut
at the end of the street where we walk
there is an ancient tower, a bathhouse
the windows surround the white marble
we look again for moss in cool fields
water passes there too under the glass
I’d have your nativity scene to resemble
the one in the cupboard at Villa Gloria
all the little statues that I would lose
in the grass of the field and on the gravel
Anna displayed them with such great care
Rusnack/Piersanti 79
today there is snow on the mountains
but it’s already March, a warm breeze blows
and I’ve a light spirit, watching a crow fly
slowly and low and taking the sun
I think of next winter in that house
my mother missing, with a woman and a son
and my new vocation in life
only the park remains in autumn
melted in moments, still as in a painting
the brown-haired girl passes through
and the leaves fall from time to time
March l989.
The Old House
up on the Cliff where the dragon
stayed, my sister went up
on silver clay, February gusts
beat against her
the wind was chilly
in those years, biting
through the sparks, in the fireplace
of another house, after my birth,
mother that tells stories,