Campaign For A Living Venice

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was very touched and grateful to receive these poems from Gary Lawless last week. Gary is a bookstore owner, poet and publisher in Maine who before the pandemic spent a one month residency in Venice with the Emily Harvey Foundation. He has published a book of poetry inspired by Venice, and has kindly shared some of his work, which I offer as a holiday gift to all the readers of CFLV. Thank you Gary, and thank you, dear readers, for your care and love for Venice.

Everything is Holy.
Bless the lagoon, sweet Lucy.
Bless the birds, the fish.
Bless the trees on the outer islands,
bless the waves and the wind.
Send the cruise ships to Hell.
There is room there
for one more boat.

Tutto e’ Sacro.
Benedetta la laguna, la dolce Santa Lucia.
Benedetti gli uccelli, i pesci.
Benedetti gli alberi delle isola lontane,
Benedetta le onde e il vento.
Mandate le navi da crociera all’inferno.
C’e ancora posto la’
per un’altra barca.

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where the outer islands meet

the sea, white on white

Istrian stone, dunes, grasses, and oak –

migration routes for

thousands of years –

Kentish terns and plovers now

disappearing, places taken by

kingfisher, herring gull, black backed gull,

all these coots, ducks, heron, and geese –

sparrow hawk, osprey, kite –

what follows when

we are gone

forever –

 

Gary Lawless