Siena, Italy

By Matthew Barton

The Romans invented arches
and placed them to invite marches
of light onto the arms of soldiers.
Like how yours rest on my shoulders.

In the attic of your cathedral halls
sits an erect column. We crawled
along the carpet stairs and shared
the arch of your back, you mare.

Your marble desk and my marble hands
held your slow back-and-forth dance
of velvet curves untangling a thread
running through the skin we wed.

Cement is just a contraction
of when we then went black from
this wrong phrase: “Come close.”
Here, no rays could have shone.