Dante in Exile

the far-sighted damned unscrolled
his fate: yours rule until theirs

return, then the gates of Florence slam
behind you!

he writes in borrowed rooms, gazes
over uncouth hills: he wanders

vineyards, olive groves, his silhouette
chained at his feet: I disturb the

very sunlight: a ghost, I still cast
shadows: he sits in the piazza that is

never Florence, watches old women
whisper and lovers whisper, usurers

and whores troll the shadows: behind his eyes
he prowls the cosmos, crypt to spire:

it's all he has left.




The Mid-America Poetry Review, Winter 2004-5, 128.