In Ruins
The searing smiting breaths of mid-day sun,
how one on one like travertine they stack
to press a weight of noon delirium
that will create the walker’s will’s collapse.
Becoming ghost, shapeshifting down the street.
Hermetic then, with wingtips on his feet.
And from his ruins we will pillage what
of his stories, histories, conspiracies
we like, and reconstruct from what we found
a thing of him we knew as true, yet not
so literally -- literarily.
We’ll charge his ghost as guide to tour the grounds.
“What am I” says the tour-guiding ghost.
To show one’s life is most that one can hope.
I wrote this after touring the ruins of Paestum and Pompeii. I spent part of both days walking around with my instructor, Johnny, a tall, white-haired sort of a guy who always carried a large Moleskine in his right hand and wore all-black wingtips. He asked me what god's powers would I choose if I could select a superpower from among the Greek pantheon. I couldn't think of anything good, so I chose Apollo for his youth and beauty, even though I'm not really obsessed with those things. (In retrospect I would choose Dionysus for his wine, theater, symposia and transformation). Johnny chose Hermes for his ability to transcend all levels of experience and to communicate with all creatures. He confided in me that he thought this place (Italy in general, but Pompeii specifically that day) was destined to kill him. The idea of becoming a ruin while simultaneously walking in ruins planted itself in my head. This was supposed to be a sonnet, but sonnets are hard.
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