Blood of Florence

The sun won’t set over Florence tonight.

It bleeds from tears in the tissue-thin clouds,

Crimson burning through Tuscan yellow light,

Carving silhouettes out of tourist crowds.

Mountains hulking at the mouth of Arno,

Lilac gods in a nimbus of fire,

Blink sleepily at Ponte Vecchio,

Piers knee-deep as the river laps higher.

I am carved in bronze and caught in amber,

On cobblestoned streets of ochre and rust.

A scent so sweet, like sugar and lumber,

Carries on the breeze of a balmy dusk.

The sun won’t set over Florence tonight,

It will bleed on for the rest of my life.