Today is Flag Day,
I fly the American flag everyday
from my porch rail, not a flagpole.
I’ve got a fever and misguided swollen feet.
My housekeeper, nurse, friend, Naomi Etienne,
says if I don’t stop working,
she’ll call the police.
I have no memory of falling asleep,
I only remember waking up.
Mayday, mayday!
I call to myself for rescue.
I find myself longitude 6 feet 2 ½,
latitude belt 40.
I suck on another’s milky words,
half asleep, I hope my apparel oft proclaims me,
I’m true to mine own self.
I cannot remember my Social Security
or fax numbers—the beginning of this.
I don’t forget my Naval Service Number:
6161612.
With this snake in a basket of groceries,
how can I develop a metaphor?
I remember the poems of others
that keep me alive, and music
that accompanies me, my closest friend.
* * *
The fish soup I make in Riverdale
is zuppa di pesce along the Arno. Grownups
no longer tuck napkins under their chins
as they did in Dante’s time,
when his currency was the gold florin,
Saint John on one side, the fleur-de-lis on the other.
Names keep secrets, Da “to give”
was short for Dante,
that was Durante.
I am among the last in Dante’s train
to San Miniato. I live with Guelphs vs
Ghibellines, Pope vs Emperor.
The years are silent as water lilies,
buggy, turning brown—
holding onto a twig on a sunny day,
a caterpillar eats through to the edge
of a leaf, builds his chrysalis.
After time enough to change, he breaks open,
unfolds a single black wing,
then two yellow and black wings
open into the world.
Someone is answering my phone calls:
“Is anyone there?” Moshi moshi,
hello, in Japanese. Hard to believe
no one said “Hello” before the 19th century.
Chief Petty Officer Young told us
the Captain expected 30% casualties.
It didn’t turn out that way,
except among my boyhood friends—
the percentage was higher.
I was decorated face and chest
by the red and white ribbons of Jerry’s brains.
Arthur lost a leg. Danny the pianist
had his spine made into an accordion.
I’m told at Auschwitz a bowl of soup
shared by four was “paradise.”
God had them on a leash,
or was it the other way around.
Truth is not factual,
has pockets, saves words like money,
half truths small change, wherewithal.
A commandment or useful proverb:
Thou shalt send your kids to war,
you will live longer.
In Tuscany, I visited a villa, ancient vineyards
that were also a cattle and pig farm. The Count complained,
“Nazis stole my Renaissance locks and keys.”
I was shown 19th Century wine presses,
ladies dancing on Montepulciano grapes,
two dogs “not allowed in the house.”
There were stalls where pigs were kept.
I didn’t say to my host: Pigs are highly intelligent,
clean, sweet as dogs in the house,
they have beautiful memories, grunt appreciations.
It’s human pigs that have made swine of them.
To kill a pig is easier than killing a child.
God knows I haven’t had a ham and cheese sandwich
for years. I’m a volunteer in two armies:
Salvation and Damnation.
—2018