Imagining the past

Here is the courtyard,
there the balcony,
fit for lovers’ wooing.

The tourists gawk and pose
embracing Juliet offensively.

You can lunch
alla Ristorante di Giullieta
if you wait till the crowds are gone.

There are too many watching
for any magic here.

But go to the monastery
through the quiet cloister
down to the silent crypt
where gravestones pave the cold floor.

Here is the empty tomb
filled with love’s tragedy,
dead lovers in the mind’s eye.


Lari Smith

Verona 5/95