O' Canada

She turns her brave
face against the cold
and up the perilous
     mountains of her stairs
shadow galleries of the fault lines of
      snow and dirty ice
 photographic
       in her vision

   Her glasses un-fogged
       sits in her tiny yellow kitchen
  watching firefly headlights
     in the grey fishbowl of
           her window

she contemplates the worth of
         even going out
              at all
her cat, indifferent, but not
          opposed to purring
    her favorite sweater has soup
            on the sleeve,
all point to staying, staying,staying

    of a good, fine , vintage
           she has no missing pieces,
 is completed

          of a true temper
 needs no filling in of spaces
          but still...

    the phone lights up
       her face blue and glows a bit
             The ones and zeroes
     are about to become a real person
       
            deep of voice she hopes, and please,
 no lying ways, and let him be
         not indifferent and not
               a whiner

like a true north, strong
           and free
              she doesn't make a fuss,
       pulls her boots on,
    sets out, because
         she can at least be
             polite.
 

Carovigno

Trickle sweet this
wine from a barrel
flow strong and thick
    as dust
our vintage with
   skins of good grapes
       dancing darkly in
 to the bottle you brought
         with you unwashed
  and all the better
   
      like the man standing on
            the stones beneath
       our violet Apuglia sky
           I know the heart of it

all the white napkins
  and icy crystal lit by
 candles and smug talk
       are thin
cover for the ugly rasping
    truth

the dirty wine of
   the village
          is the best wine there is
and her strong sour kiss
      is a mountain
 for my heart,

and i weep for the
         lack of it
and i dream of
        her dry, gentle hands
and i pity the man who
    has never stood among
       her struggling
trees,
     smelled her bread
          or wept from
    her salty breeze

The turning away

Squatting down in the
     ruins of houses, grit
 marked by dainty tracks
  of birds, beetles,
           the fetid rivers
        lapping at the edges
   of their sandals, this
       is their highest form
     of personal
             worth,
  this barbaric cesspool of a place,
      where empty shells of
            old dwellings are
         used as toilets by
   the lofty, enlightened, sanctified
          inhabitants.

   this chattering , stinking mass
        fucking the ground with their
             empty foreheads,
tapping their swirling bunghole rugs
         pretending pious
 acting rapist
           grasping,
             for the world that they only
        accuse of corruption, pausing
                   every hateful declaration
                                     long enough to suckle from
the people of the west who
                they call devils and demons,
                    cashing their checks and nose
 to the air, living freely in the
             elegant cities they have
                    defiled,
               who are they to judge...anyone?

     The next war should not be a war at all..
           next war is a turning away of
               all of us, from
 these turd apostles, leaving them
            throwing them
     to themselves
           all that we do
                is nothing,
                  no news
no food, no help
          let those who can
              stand up on their hind legs
                 and silence these unholy excrements
or watch their own children turn
      into ammunition
            piled,exhausted
 or living skeletons condemned
        by unreason
              to starve, to be
  disconnected forever to rape and kill
            each other in the
         ruined dark desert ,

    Every bridge broken,
               every attempt to come here
                    met with a firm unwavering hand
         to the face, if need be.
they can wage their holy war
        against themselves
             and if they starve, burn,
                      or fall ill
     of an easy plague
            which we refuse to cure
 so much the better,
                   so little the loss
                           so inevitable that the
           stupid and angry be mocked
                       and then forgotten