you walked past my defences months ago --
casually, sauntering, as if they were no more
than cobweb. you sun yourself in the piazza,
paddle your bare feet in the fountains.
your lonely footsteps echo
off the shuttered facades of my streets,
you kick up dust, shuffle through dry leaves.
no one has been here for so long.
but you enter nowhere, touch nothing, you bring
your own water, your own food. you trust nothing
in this strange town, leave nothing behind.
you neither litter nor loot.
wary and self-contained you wander
without lingering, leave open windows
and half-open doors alone. not even a fingerprint
remains where you have passed. not even that.
the cafe tables beckon and you walk past them;
the four-poster bed waits behind blowing curtains,
in the park a hammock droops empty, an untouched meal
steams on the trattoria counter. gelato melts
in its dish. and you walk past:
oblivious, or determined to ignore.
flowers bloom and you neither pick nor smell them.
the ripe fruits of the market scent the air and
you walk past. cats follow you unregarded,
you do not feed the birds. the city weeps.
it wants a guest, an inhabitant, it wants
to be of use. how you frustrate it:
untouchable and untouching, haunting and haunted,
when it wants you to linger among earthly joys.
when it yearns to feed you, to shelter you,
to guard your sleep.
so many comforts disdained; you look anxiously
at the town clock and the gate. a cold road
leads forth and you prefer it. and shouldering
that heavy knapsack of regrets you walk away.
and yet my heart remains open, ville ouverte;
hoping against hope that you will return, and stay.
-- GPL Aug 2005 D. A. Clarke