When I talk about the Roman ruins,

don’t you understand? That could have

been us. They were beautiful once too

like we are now.

I know you forget things like this.

Now the Colosseum fragments itself

into dust and grime

and five-cent Euro coins,

but long ago

it smelt of nervous flesh,

the sweat of men, the steel of

swords, and of blood on the

dirt floor at the very

end.

Pompeii has long since been

strangled by the ashes

of its father, which still sits,

old, tired--

a mountaintop stretching its limbs

upward to heaven, while

children and widows and lovers

and prostitutes and thieves

slumber and bake eternally under the Southern Italian

sun.

I will remind you again and again

until you absorb this,

like a grain of sand into

the shores of the Mediterranean,

like a drop of red wine

slowly sinking into a

linen tablecloth,

like olive oil onto bread

at noon on an early spring

day.

I know you forget things like this so I will tell you:

We feel ancient

but we are still so young.