Phases. Mischa Willett

      Sprezzatura

      Do not, like a purse-dog,

      like a show pony, bare

      your infirm affection for

      everyone in the colosseum

      to see. Better for them

      to guess at your secret

      desires, your lusts

      and ambition, better

      for them to detect in

      your stride some adroit

      manner, in your eye

      some devious shine, and think:

      I should be careful

      around this one.

      They should.

      Better for you to know,

      and be thinking, there is

      a tangle of passages

      and thruways intricate

      as arteries teeming under

      the gladiatorial contest.

      A Lie, their Hands

      at the Bocca Della Verita

      Here’s the spot they stitched

      the coin of his face back into

      itself; you can trace

      with your finger the rough

      splice running over his eye

      where someone tried to make

      it look as though the circle hadn’t

      broken, that truth was still spoken

      from the mouth thereof

      and people hadn’t lined up to tell a lie,

      their hands shoved down his throat.

      It says something about our senses

      of restoration, no? And something else

      about the past. What, exactly?

      Ask.

      Mnemesis

      My students rib

      me all the time:

      you know who you look

      like? Scipio Africanus,

      the Roman general who

      finally defeated Hannibal

      and his elephants

      to close the Punic

      trouble.

      It doesn’t bother me,

      usually, but I do tire

      of hearing the history bit.

      Hannibal and the elephants!

      As if I could forget!

      Place Order Here

      Her line of well-wishers extends

      around the counter where, handed

      their cups, each toss a coin

      into her Sunday my earshot