Fontegaia jingle-jangles along...

19

 
I meant for Siena to be a sign, Julie   like the
miniature city   in the palm of the Emperor's hand
but there is no adequate sign   each one a dead end
compared to this   manifold Providence   the light air

 
shifts & manifests   both here & there   & the emblem
for justice done just right   no emblem but the thing
itself can stand   on that last bright day   burning
up the straw   in the denouement   of a smiling

 
stratagem   that clear intellectual thing   that seeps
(a mariner's dew)   from the eye   of the Old Man
in Concrete or   the plastered judge (in the western)
crying out   like a prophet   the milk of kindness keeps

 
on spreading   on its way   thicker than blood
so   it will be   when the sun cries out
you are the sun   your heart   reflecting the root
of itself   O   pigeon, home   in the neighborhood

 
steeped there   humble   as public servant,   or
copperhead dove   shy profile   etched in money
for a counterweight (In God We Trust)  one penny
balanced   even, equitable   as is   the blind goddess

 
figuring it forth   because (as Williams understood)
Providence will not be forced   since peace comes
climbing slow (take hold now, grasp   thy tendril sum
in pregnant shade   of vine & fig) as it always would

 
as it always would   come round   & spin
like a tip   on a piano top   where the Professor
skips along   some high-C melody   & so to soar
into the octave   waiting there   like a Carib djinn