Venice
                               

Singing woke me.
There were sounds of unknown voices in the street.
A boat was passing on the canal.
A porcelain mask lay on the table.

The cantata was by Scarlatti.
The voices echoed from the Carnival.
Because you left on that passing boat
I did not place the mask over my face

or cross the bridge of Istrian stone
as cool and white as your body.
I did not enter the sea-scented palace
hung with glistening tapestries of swans.

Instead I saw doves thicken in the square
and then the air began to form
its first hushed gestures of snow
like a slow, eerie mime.

When the swift flakes were falling,
when there were too many wounds to be grasped,
when April was just another small gray coal
left to crumble inside the heart

I sat at the table to shape
these dark, fading syllables,
this black salt tossed into
the empty cauldron of spring.