Entasis

by Liana Scalettar

In 1989 I still knew how to dress. You didn’t know me then; I hadn’t thought I could ever meet you or earn you, I could only buy things and never give over my body’s or soul’s selves to anyone.

On the Via Margutta I leave myself and become this house, that courtyard,
That vin santo all apricot and grasses. Why search for symbols? There, in the perfect glass, rests the mouthful of
Perfect wine.

A nameless boy’s tongue startles me as much as chestnut honies.

by Liana Scalettar

Goethe’s Italy isn’t
Ours. In Termini, while nearby stone angels teeter and vibrate, their molecules aquiver like anyone else’s, their lyres and harps sounding to those who can still hear such threnodies and hymns, their tunics soft-falling, their river-watching stalwart, we linger too long over water and what used to be called cornetti, our eyes too rheumy to gobble up all that goldenrod Naples yellow with which we’re surrounded.

Soon.
Soon.
It is unlike me when faced by beauty to admit – in order to care for you more fully – defeat.