Poem about Venice

[valis2]

I spoke with one of my dearest friends, blumsmile, tonight. She's one of those "arc" friends, someone who has seen you at your best, and your worst, and knows you so well after all these years. We've been friends since we were about fourteen.

She asked me about my lion statue obsession.

So here it is...the poem that started it all. I wrote it right after I returned from Venice (in 1997, I think). Mostly uncorrected, just as I wrote it. It isn't perfect, but it encapsulates a moment for me, and that's what is important.

The last bit is talking about the lion in this particular icon, btw.


Venice

an archway leading nowhere
a house in the middle of the street

I can take pictures of lions if I want to

quiet alley with wells capped with iron
private garden behind stone walls

I know this church before I step inside

the rhythm
the quiet

I want no more than this feeling, this age, these tiny, unsure motions, these ominous cracks in the wall. Somehow they won't translate, won't cross the customs line; I'll be asked why so many pictures of lions and I won't have the ready answer. What was it I wanted here?

the rise and fall of the boat, the fondament, the soul
catalogued and charted, walled, prayed upon

Who am I when I'm alone?

candles lit in dark iron
lira dropped in coffers

There isn't much time left. I want to go home. I want to never leave. I want to live...with a car? a boat?

a wisp
a bright frail scarf

What holds my hands to the camera, tries to capture the lyrical sweetness each new street affords me?
What forces Prendo questo from behind my teeth, taking the unlovely souvenirs, wanting more to say in a foreign tongue?

the lion holds the book
the lion holds the church

I don't belong to this bright canal, to this dark lamppost, to this sharp and crooked alley, but it speaks to me anyway, translating into a decadent yearning to know a different birth, to swim in a new sea, to discover the hidden bones of an Italian dream.

iron flowers hide the door
angels stare dispassionately from above

I cross the same bridge many times, wondering who stepped here before, who touched the stone, who glided beneath it. A statue of a man I have never met, a church where every flagstone hides a dead family. A saint's foot whose toes point heavenward. Marble coffins, exhortations not to take pictures, walls thick with sarcophagi. I am a mute witness to the stern power whose voice first uttered, The church will be here, whose vision forced the granite to yield to his touch, who pinned down the land with pilings.

here is a house for Marco Polo
here is a bridge of sighs

I want to express the beauty, the grace, the antiquity, anything.

in a lion's heart
the angel crushes the serpent

Too wise for a gondola, too silly to find my way home.

curling bridges
the path is made of silent stones immune to feet

Only a scarce moment away lies the sea-green canal, fresh with danger, romance, knowledge. Blind, mecurial, hungry; I wish for a boat, for the sheer novelty of it, for the superficial bliss of a moment's thrill.

walking the maze
waking the minotaur

I am lost in Venice's graces, unknown, hemmed by churches, mute. No one's idea of who I am exists. I am deaf in two languages, only connected by a single hand that clutches the camera, hoping to awaken some artistic soul within it.

I see the lion.

He is behind glass.

I raise the camera to my eye.

Comments

[b2wm.livejournal.com]

Wonderful. I begin to see the moment through the poem, and the little mistakes are harder to see with its structure. The way you wove the two chains of thought was great.

[valis2.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you liked it. At the time, it was one of the best poems I'd written, and I loved it tremendously. It brings my trip to Venice back to me in a wonderful way.

[mneomosyne.livejournal.com]

In a way this explains a lot ♥ from the lion's head to as why to visit Venice. You captured the feeling that also lives in 'Death in venice' by Thomas mann and in the music by Mahler. :)

[valis2.livejournal.com]

heh...yes, this explains the lion obsession! ;)

Thanks for reading!

Venice really is dripping with history. It's amazing.

[verdenia.livejournal.com]

Wow! This is enchanting. I totally want to go to Venice!
Ahh, someday. You know, in the next 4 3.75 years, just in case 2012 is real. :P

[valis2.livejournal.com]

Venice is one of the most sublime cities on earth...at least, in my opinion. The most romantic city I've ever visited. Absolutely heavenly.