My Poetry: Piazza Santa Croce: Gen

Title: Piazza Santa Croce
Poetic Form: Xenolith
Rating: Gen
Length: 95
Notes: Inspired by this photograph of the Piazza Santa Croce, Florence, Italy [the church is reflected in pooled rainwater]

The old piazza’s paved with slabs of dark grey stones
in gaps, in cracks, the mirrored shards
which bleed abandoned rain from jagged veins, from bones
torn scraps of ten-a-rack postcards
the traffic, natural, pedestrian, which hones
facades to be avoided, shunned
except as art. The priested, nunned
variety to smooth, eroding knowns, unknowns
and pilgrimed, secular, devout
in after-storm and puddle-grout.
The shallow dips collect, reflect the startled moans
collect, reflect the beauty fleet,
lamenting once-dry-socked feet; the old square disowns
ephemeral and indiscreet,
its faults. It stands, and lies, as water pools, atones.