The dawn casts its shadow once more upon the front line,
Fear, licking its lips, strangles the unknown.
Frothing and foaming, it slips under the crack in your door,
Imprints itself upon corrugated steel,
Flashes its grin in a moment of reflection
On a canal that does not sit still.
From Dorsoduro to Giardini
Perhaps six, or seven
All beady-eyed
Inquisitive
Cloaked in suspicion.
Paralysed lies the city,
And I could not,
Speak,
At seeing history stopped with a single blow.
Murky silence fogs the land,
And the clouds now gather overhead,
Leaving desire
Melted.
Only the church bells ring now,
Carving up an endless time,
To an empty congregation.
At once a ray urges through the blackness,
A long lost sun
A dot in the void
Refusing to be forgotten.
And just for a moment,
That splash upon agitated waters
Is not the quivering hand,
Or dropping of tears.
At once the starlings,
Teetering on roof tiles
Cast open their streaked wing
And imbue the sky with their soulful song.
At once the wisteria,
Arm in arm to face the cold,
Bloom above pavements left dead
By a hopeless generation.
They do hope.
The candle flickers alight,
The door creaks ajar
Man shows his face
To a faceless wind.
A miraculous play
Where all the living take part
Until the curtain falls
Upon the final act
So we must fight with heart.
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