Poetry

Stalking Prisons

Published in Indian Ruminations

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The rough white marble’s like stained silver

under the scorching light of the

blazing July sun.

It’s everywhere. Blinding me,

hurting my vision, my limbs,

suffocating, reminding me of the trap I was

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held in.

The streets are empty with no one in sight,

I check the big clock of the tower

behind the basilic of Saint Francis of Assisi.

It’s 2 o’clock on a mid-summer Tuesday afternoon.

Everything’s shut.

Everyone’s resting.

My heart’s hitting the walls of its all so tight ribcage,

as I need to cross the brightly lit square

and go to the other side,

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leave the shadow, leave my hideout,

leave life under the trees.

Steeping out in the open square’s

walking directly into the firestorm,

on a battlefield

in an occupied territory

of a dying city.

I take a heavy step, followed by another.

My feet are made of lead, my breath- of gunpowder

my hands numb, my fingers trembling,

my skin hurting,

my eyes against the dazzle – worse.

But I keep going until I reach another shadow,

until I reach the comfort of a breeze

under an umbrella- it’s the tent of a café

“Are you perhaps French?”

My breath catches, a deep voice in a lulling Italian accent, and I

turn.

“No, I…“

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“Please, come in, sit here in the shade. “

Away from the light, away from the world.

Away from remembering.

I follow in relieved

under the indifferent eyes of the Medusa

peeking at us from above,

perched on the nicely decorated façade of the building across.

I take a final look at what’s been left behind-

at the white sunlight square

so much like a white, burning desert,

so much like home.

Yet not really.

Because no one gets shot –

blood and brains, and bones and lungs spilt

on pretty open squares here.