Red Venice
for
Y.F.
Dans Venise le rouge/ Ni un cheval bouge (In red Venice/ Not a horse is moving) –Alfred de Musset, written before he had seen Venice
In solitary London
all the stone steps are connected
In brave Accra
dolls float in the lagoons
In silent Munich
night has a long tongue
In drifting Chicago
iron hammers fall slowly
In ascendant Minneapolis
the tall mirrors have wheels
In frozen Paris
children can breathe tulle
In fragrant Ulan Bhator
knife-grinders hymn the moon
In crenellated Mumbai
craneflies invite thunder
In shiny Dallas
a rooster screams among certainties
In bored Asuncion
the bishop dissects a virgin
In vacant Shanghai
acrobats own the streets
In luminous Harare
only obsidian has wings
In blue Santiago de Cuba
no moths are arrested
In crystalline Akron
willows bend to the crows
In ghostly Novgorod
great mantids tiptoe
In muscular Rome
apartments open like books
In smooth Cuernavaca
a wind-spirit caresses herself
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