“Before I was born the evicted/ Irish walked this road,/
with no notion where to aim/ their anger. What was left// of their households
bruised/ their shoulders. What remained/ was a broken gate and the reek/ of
spoiled potatoes.”
—R.T. Smith, “Road Fever”
Before I was born, women drenched young girls in gowns white
as ash, the white of the eyes, the white of marble, the white of the marble of
the Forum where they would live, tending fire with soft hands that never knew their
own hearths. What privilege, feet wrapped in soft leather straps, gold
wreathing curls, to stand beside the returning emperor, to be Nike, wings
reflecting hard as iron in the city’s eyes, gathered, standing always, forever
like the massive columns ringing the city, like the immense ring of the
Coliseum, never to be eaten away. Forbidden to eat, the vestals would breathe
earth if found with an apple in their bellies, banked fires. Now, the wet
kisses of a thousand red poppies cover the Forum’s weeds and high grass, the
marble dissolved, mere suds in the vast centuries, and teenagers kiss on the
wasted stone. Nike looks on from every direction, gold face reflecting from
twin chariots on the roof of the Museum of Italian Immigration, wings clipped,
mouth closed to a grimace, her hard feet missing wind and the cries of the
masses. I drift through the Forum, wanting my boyfriend’s body next to me,
sweating together in the heat of Rome.
No comments:
Post a Comment