Irish, French, and Italian Sketches in Poems

Crossing the Rope Bridge

at Carrick-a-Rede (Ireland)

We walk along the cliffs

above the crashing sea far

below as gulls and gannets

circle above in cloudy skies,

and then we descend the

steps far down to a rickety

rope bridge eighty feet above

a gap where salmon swim

between the Irish mainland

and a lone offshore island laced

with windswept flowers and heather.

As we stand and stare at the waves,

our rope bridge begins to sway

in forceful gusts of wind forcing

us to quick retreat on solid land.

Point au Raz (France)

Out here on the western most

tip of France, we perch ourselves

high on a mossy rock to watch

the surf come and pound the cliffs

and send forth sheets of spray

ever skyward toward the blazing

and hot sun as if to extinguish it.

Sea gulls laugh at our bemusement

as they flap their wings, distancing

themselves and leaving us all

alone to our own flights of thought.

Carrick-a-Rede is in northern Antrim and Pointe au Raz is the western-most point of France.

Canaleto's Painting Of a Venetian Scene

I stand and stare at a framed painting

of Giovanni Antonio Canaletto's Piazza

San Marco to recall our own Venetian

days of riding the vaporetto on the

Grand Canal, under an orange ball of

sun, to land at Saint Mark's Square and

walk past swarms of pigeons as we enter

the ancient, aging, crumbling basilica

and approach the sarcophagus of gospel

writer Saint Mark placed here, after hundreds

of years in Egypt, in his final resting place

under four grand domes and a campanile

rising to the sky where we emerge into a

bright sun and amble along the winding

Venetian streets framed with canals gleaming

in the sun and hundreds of humans and pigeons.
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