Fine

Antonioni died yesterday—
Jeanne Moreau walks around Milan
alone, her footfalls incessant,
her shoulders like the moon
at yellow dusk.

If I must mourn an ending,
I want to glow
like Jeanne Moreau—
solemn and curious,
a floral sundress, Italian pumps.

Dammit if I won't hold onto lost love
the way that director held
his camera on an actor—
too long—her false eyelashes fluttered,
her face fell into its own old lines—

Menu Turistica, Episode VI

Post under construction



[In the next episode, Elena eats a mysterious breakfast.]

Menu Turistica, Episode V

Post under construction

Non perche non perche non perche. Now the words bounced around her own footsteps. She paced the wall several times. By now, surely, Luigi was far below, cursing at the Italian traffic on its way out of the city. Or perhaps he decided to stop at the bottom of the hill and give her another chance. Or perhaps he decided to stop at the bottom and lie in wait. Or perhaps he decided to stop along the winding road down. Or perhaps he was still watching her from the parking lot. Or perhaps. Or perhaps. Non perche non perche.

The sun having given the last of its display, the last of the tourists wandered away from the wall toward their cars. A few young lovers stayed on, making out. A car rolled up to the edge of the parking lot and tipped out onto the road down.

Elena measured the descent toward the river. At one end of the stone wall, the wide path took a 180 degree turn and descended directly below her, terminating at the next tier of the road. A petite sports car whipped down this road and disappeared. Across the road, a much narrower path disappeared into trees. It was all she could know of the path. The dark foliage closed around the path and the rake of the mountain obscured the unknown. Down much further, football fields away, she could see another stone walkway, the back side of a building, the road that ran alongside the Arno. She considered walking along the road, but the roadway had two dangers—sports cars and Luigi. For all she knew, he had waited at the top of the Piazzalle until he thought she might come to this very point, where he could scoop her up and carry her away. It was an irrational though; she could feel what little light was left in the sunset slowly trickling away from her, fuddling her mind. Surely, the walk was not more than ten or fifteen minutes. She could and would do it, quickly and confidently.

The wind kicked up in the trees. A trio of young Asian women tottered at the head of the path, their giggles high and bright like wind chimes, fading up and out of the breeze. Their heels clattered on the pavement. A man’s cologne caught Elena’s nose and she turned her head quickly, wondering if Luigi had returned. Not Luigi, the man in the plaid shirt lingered at the wall, taking surreptitious glances at the trio of Asian women. He was plain-looking, unmemorable and slightly unkempt. In a less baggy pair of jeans, perhaps wearing one of those fine merino black sweaters and squared-toed shoes with nice stitching, he might have had a chance with them, Elena thought. But not slumped over, hands up under his shirt tail searching for his pockets. She felt sorry for him. In that moment, he began to move toward the descent as well. The five of them looked as if they would converge and caravan. Elena was relieved. Safety in numbers.

Elena shifted her weight toward the trio. The man in the plaid shirt, walking more swiftly, passed her, and then the trio at well. His passing made them hesitate and stop, but Elena was already walking purposefully toward them. She did not slow; she had made the decision to go, and go she would. She would follow the man and the women would follow her. Walk confidently. Know where to go. Be purposeful. Non. Perche. Non. Perche. She pushed the heel of her hand against her forehead, but she could not keep from replaying the events of the day in her mind, how she should have turned away from the conversation, how she could have gracefully turned down the coffee. It was the coffee that set the wheels in motion.

As she passed the trio, they slowed their pace. They slowed their pace just as the momentum of the hill was carrying Elena further. She turned back to see them stopping. Elena wondered if she should stop. She hesitated just a moment, one foot in the air, but the momentum carried it down, and she stumbled forward the next few steps, forcing her back into a more steady pace. She paced but looked back up at them, now. They had their heads together and they were whispering. How silly they seemed, in their escalator shoes, their short skirts and their swingy hair. Keep going, Elena willed them. Keep walking. Oh what good were they. Those shoes! They wouldn’t dare hike down a mountain. If they hadn’t been so stupid, she would have questioned their reason for stopping—the way they looked down the hill, the way they giggled and pushed each other back up to the parking lot. It was as if they knew something that she did not. Something shamefully comical. Quaintly pathetic.

Elena turned back toward the man in the plaid shirt. He had stopped a little way from the road. He was hidden now from the people above but not from Elena or the three women. There had been something about his motions that had caught her eye earlier, but she had been too busy pondering whether she could find safe comraderie with three grown women wearing tarty variations on a schoolgirl’s uniform. Now she saw what he had been doing—unlooping his belt. She looked at his face, but he was staring out toward the Arno. He eyes were unfocussed, blissful, frightened, business like.

He dropped his pants and pulled up his shirt, exposing himself. He stood like a sculpture, his pair of old tennis shoes just peeking out beneath the folds of his baggy jeans. Elena’s mind played a trick on her and on him. It blocked out the rest of the picture, fuzzed it over. Static filled her ears as well. It wasn’t happening and couldn’t be happening. Dirty old men and flashers were the stuff of bad bar jokes. A priest and a rabbi came hopping out of the forest. She turned and saw three blind women sitting on a park bench. Three nuns came riding by on a bicycle-built for three followed by a duck and a chicken. A bus carried a troop of munchkins; it was driven by a monkey with wings.

The regular world returned, the man in the plaid shirt, the giggling of the girls at the top of the hill, the sound of her feet on the pavement. Elena blushed, the blood adding to the pressure in her head, against her chest, swelling in her hands and feet. She was moving too quickly to brake her pace but still she tried make the decision whether to turn back or continue. In her hesitation, she slowed as she approached him, then, realizing her error, picked up speed and passed him, a statue in the growing dark. Dark figures swayed up at the Piazzalle, unaware of the events below.

She entered the wood, the most direct line through the surreal. Perche. Non. Risk management, her father once said over a pork chop dinner. It’s amazing how many bad things can happen. If you knew the statistics, you wouldn’t ever drive a car. Her mother had burned herself on the oven, again. Sometimes she had trouble doing things with her right hand. Her right hand—Elena could barely see it in front of herself. Even the last lingering rays peaking up from under the horizon could not illuminate the dirt on which she stepped. She pulled a keychain from her pocket and illuminated a small penlight. It cast a halo of light on the path, barely large enough to discern more than her next step. But the light made the shrubs seem to gather in more closely. The wind made them chatter and rustle—the extended fading away of applause. She refused to look behind her, concentrating, instead, on placing her feet carefully on the uneven trail. She swung her light into the bushes up ahead.

Risk management. Don’t ever get into a car. The car was just a step in the process, the chain of events set into motion by agreeing to have coffee. If she had thanked him for his suggestion but said she had somewhere else to be, he may have simply nodded his head and departed. Unless he was more than just a dirty old man. Would he have persisted or looked for another easy target? She was the easy target of the day. Yet to step out of bed in the morning was to accept risk. If she were honest with herself, she would admit that she was feeling more reckless. When her father died, she realized that his risk, so carefully managed, meant nothing next to the statistics. He always wanted to go to Italy, her mother said one night, much later and inexplicably.

She came up to another patch of the road. She barely bothered to look left or right. Forget the sportscar. She feared Luigi and the half-naked man chasing her down the mountain. He would catch up to her and make her look at him. Make her peer right at him. He would catch her wrist so that she couldn’t escape. He would put his hand at the back of her head so that she couldn’t look away. She would try to keep her eyes on the rumpled jeans and his dirty tennis shoes, the top edge of a white sock, vaguely loose where the elastic was overused.

Perche. Perche. Perche. Perche. Perche. The wonderful things he does. Lions and tigers and bears. She did not know whether to be noisy and large or invisibly silent. What was it one did in the vicinity of black bears, lecherous men? Make noise and act crazy? For grizzlies and rapists, play dead—or was it the other way around? She stumbled on a rock, but did not fall. Her feet thudded on the hard-packed ground. She saw the outline of a dark figure ahead of her, but instead of stopping and turning back, her momentum plunged her toward him. So did the inevitability of her own recklessness.

Oh my. The statistics. Chances are the bullet will miss you if you are running away. Statistically, she was destined to die young. The wind caught up her hair and blew it in her face so quickly, and as she reached up to push it back out of her eyes, the penlight swung up into the trees and sent the shadows around her fluttering like bats. The figure moved from side to side, like a blocker in a game of football. An eyelash caught in her eye and blinded her momentarily. She heard the figure laugh; it sounded like the guffawing of a car engine, the bark of a dog.

The figure loomed, about to jump out of the shadows. She walked more quickly, she would barrel over him. She would embrace him. She would rock him in her lap like a Renaissance Jesus. Have you ever been to Piazzale Michelangelo? It’s the most romantic place in Florence, the most beautiful views in all of Tuscany. The light is idyllic. The women swoon. The vendors sell peanuts and Italian flags until sundown. It’s a carnival. Her breath filled her brain and her heart beat like a Spanish drum on Good Friday. A high scream slithered out of an engine with a belt in need of lubrication.

It was a pillar. In fact, it was the pillar marking the exit of the path. The forest ceased. The sky opened up above her. The Arno swished along like a woman on her way to a ball. Elena stood, shivering, on a half-circle of cement, a perch that overlooked the Arno. It had a stone railing, as if it were a balcony, and uneven steps down to a parking lot. She paused, but just for a moment.

She took the stairs nearly at a run. They zig zagged under the bridge and terminated into a dark parking lot, where Luigi’s car had been parked. The traffic was louder, now, as a traffic light released another group of cars. She ran her eyes across the hoods of the cars, looking for predators she could not know and did not understand.

She felt footsteps behind her before the traffic sounds faded enough for her to hear them. She could not turn, could not bear it. She did not want to expose her face. She kept her head down. She was walking quickly, but he came upon her more quickly. It would be Luigi. He would grab her arm and spin her toward him, raise his hand and…

The footsteps belonged to a businessman in a trench coat, a briefcase bobbing along with his steps as he passed her, keys rattling in his hands as he approached his car. She breathed again. It was not Luigi and not the man in the plaid shirt. It was not Massimo #1 or Massimo #2 or the waiter at Casalingha. It was no one paying attention to her. She pulled a slip of paper from her pocket and stared at the unfamiliar email address. She was suddenly and terribly hungry.

[in the next episode, Elena tries to drive South]

Pazzo Fig Risotto

almost served in Menu Turistica, episode V

5 cups vegetable, chicken, or beef stock
1/2 cup white wine
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 onion
1-1/2 cup arborio rice
1-2 teaspoon(s) salt, depending upon the saltiness of the stock
1-1/2 cup chopped figs
juice and zest from one lemon
1/2 cup grated parmigiano reggiano plus more for the table
salt and pepper to taste

In a saucepan, heat the stock and wine to a simmer. In a heavy-bottomed skillet or dutch oven, melt 2 tablespoons of the butter in the olive oil over low to medium heat. Sweat the onions and salt until translucent, about ten minutes. Increase the heat to medium and add the rice, sauteeing until partially transluscent and beginning to stick to the bottom of the pan, about five minutes. Begin to add the stock, one ladle full at a time, stirring continuously until the liquid is nearly absorbed and the rice begins to stick to the bottom of the pan. After 3/4 of the stock has been incorporated, begin to test the rice for doneness between further additions of stock—rice should be firm but not crunchy. When the rice is nearly done, stir in the last ladle of stock, figs, and lemon juice. When the last of the liquid is nearly incorporated, add the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter, parmigiano reggiano, and salt and pepper to taste. Serve immediately, topped with zest and more parmigiano reggiano, with halved figs and lemon slices as garnish. Serves 2 as a main course, 4 as an appetizer.

Blueprint

The poem unrolls to a grimy-gray, gossamer-lined, finger-printed, criss-crossed blueprint. The builder deconstructs it on the vacant lot.

As a playwright’s stage direction leaves space for the director’s voice, the poet-architect sketches specifically without specifications. For the building to succeed in its mission to serve physical needs, the poet leaves the brand of toilet to the builder’s interpretation.

Because it is a poem and not an architectural drawing, lines do not make windows, doors, stairwells, or ramps for the handicap, nor is it required to withstand fire or earthquakes or tsunamis or boisterous dinner parties or separations or the quiet undoing of early morning sex. The words can be tall and thin and quiet and stand without girders or foundation.

They can be nothing like a building at all, and yet a general contractor will bid for the assignment and hire subcontractors and explain to the workers that this is not the kind of hotel or high-rise upon which they are accustomed to laying their hammers. In fact, it is not a public place at all; rather, it is the place where a man climbs inside the trunk of a redwood and takes a picture of the woman toward whom he feels a fondness, if not love.

Very quietly, the project manager, who has arrived very early in the morning so that the workers will respect him, unrolls the blueprint and reads from it in a steady and deep voice:

in sleep
eyelashes
flicker
against
the cheek
like sun
against a
white wall
in wind

a body
heaves
and clicks
like a
radiator
in an old,
unoccupied
apartment

The workers, not altogether confused, move silt from mound to mound. The project manager returns to his office and to his files, where he writes contracts for constellations. Through the doorway, he can see that a woman sits on the edge of a bed. Her back is to him. Her shoes are on the floor next to her. The blueprint is unrolled against a pillow. She is reading it.