I
Shining pebbles on a washed-out shore
cobblestone sea routes
strings of shadows
two metal pieces
on shut child eyelids

Phillip the Second holding the harness
raising his hand
gathering voices
gallops from Pella
on a silver journey
                    the journey of coins

Coins on your too shut eyelids

the horse restless
sniffing the canker breeze
frozen
as the wooden oar
carries you across
to Lethe

                           Persephone

                                               Calypso

                                                           ΚΑΛΥΠΤΩ

                                                                       To Cover

II
Shoulders of belief
all in flaring white
                    carrying
wooden forms
and red carnations

looking down

the smell of candle-light on darkened glass
the tremoring stretch above the flame
the moist liras on trays of hand-made lace

Good Friday in Valetta

III
At the Western edge of the city
maps of deep waters float
sea monsters    astral beasts
books of worn voyages
pages and their edges
                    those of the seas
smell of damp paper
puffs of caldeirada flooding the streets

Da Gama awake in Belém
clocks that persist across the nightscape
narrow routes that twist
                    and lead to the city

The shimmering coin tossed
the edge of the world betted

IV
Forest of cries
roots soaked in voices
                    the vastness of Ardennes

Stained glass windows
red green and amber
                   a silent drenching

Black beer at the Falstaff
and the last of your eighty francs
scattered on the old oak table

V
Trinkets    paintings    pots
yellow-glazed
at a bargain

Walking down melodious crowds
among the tapestries of El Rastro
white linen
               with almond-garlic taste
               washed down with cider

Moonlight approaches
my hands in payer
the golden fountain
                   the puns of reflections
                   ten    searching    fingers

Under the marble lions’ manes
pesetas lie dreaming
at the Plaza de la Cibeles

VI
Snow-capped arches    castle of vines
old Slavic stone
                   overlooks the river

under the buried ground
a melted chest with rusty lock
coins of blind gold

Invaders at Ptuj
like pletnas¹ floating in the mist

VII
Sunrays throbbing in the street
but you alone unwarmed in pools of metal
the surgeon’s scaffold in heaps of broken glass
heightens and dives with steel persistence
the bullet alive biting child flesh

Invaders floating in the mist
dark skies alight in flaring green

The shimmering coin tossed
sour An Najaf tea to last the operation
the polished coin, the blade in silence
the silver beast spreading its wings

¹pletna = traditional Slovenian boat