reprieve, in It

the man selling photos
is reading a book
and not-so-much
selling his photos.
they are dark, divided
into twirling ballet
dancers or
bridges in Venice,
where I am now.

his nose is in a drab-looking
white paperback;
periodically we will both come
up from our respective pages
and assess the crowd
for obviously different reasons.

a scraggly brown dog is
lying next to him, emphatically
chewing his ass
as if it will take him somewhere.
in my own realm of homo erectus,
I’ve been guilty
of much the same thing.

*     *     *

it is damned hot today
and we are all out in It.
I should go get drunk
but I’m shaded.

to the left, finally,
an open house
of God.
there is too much going on
in the street today.

I’ll get up, look east
to the bar
then go west—
into,
under,
past the vaulted archway
of the basilica.