We met at the Campanile
in Piazza San Marco,
an ex-lover and I,
ten years had passed
a noticeable change
in our girth and mien,
we celebrated our reunion,
with a Fanta at Café Florian
Twenty dollars,
we had to pay the piano player,
we hadn't noticed the piano player,
but the October sunshine
warm and dry on our backs
soothed our jet-lagged souls
the vaporetto to our pensione
and all along the Grand Canal
the palazzi, bridges and churches
luminous and illusory,
like in a liquid dream,
the gondolas of the rich,
funereal and reminiscent
of Death in Venice
I took a walk
from our quarter
to St. Mark's
the snaking streets black and slick
in the night rain
in the evenings risotto
and sweet white wine
the galleries and museums memorable
Canaletto, Giotto,
but chiefly
it was the facade of Venice
that beguiled me,
the architecture, the fantasy, the dream
the secret alleyways that lead to scenes of gondoliers
lounging sanguine in the haze
this captured my imagination
brown leaves and grey pigeons
scud across the piazza
it is time for the train
to Padova, and Mantova and Verona,
ah but thereby hangs another tale.