Eating San Gimignano

Towers of gift-wrapped cakes rise
over the counters of the pasticceria
across the street from Hotel Bel Soggiorno
where three of us share a room.

Powdered in white sugar, packed
with blanched almonds, hazlenuts,
and honey, these torte sell whole.
The old woman whose cheeks

gleam red as roof tiles
will slice them if you like, serve you
a piece of panforte, mandorlata,
golden, brown as the towers

that cluster near the center of town.
We have climbed two. We imagine
life in the thirteen hundreds,
what it must have been like

to be a Guelph, building a higher
tower than anyone else, soaring
over the Joneses, the Ghibellines.
From the tallest tower we can peer

down streets that twist
into threads of dark caramel.
Our dinners are included
in the price of our room.

We order a la carte: tagliarini arrabbiata,
devil's chicken flaming, sprigged with rosemary,
a bottle of vernaccia, and, for a dolce,
tiramisu, slices of soft cake, layers, white

cheese, whipped cream--"lift me up," it means.
As if eating this much this well
were not adding to luggage
already too heavy

for a fast change of trains. As if
we are filling only with lightness,
our bellies and buttocks spreading
like summer clouds

billowing over the Tuscan hills
where swallows float
above vineyards, hazy, and dust
sifts like loose sugar

from dry soil, from cracks
between bricks of towers, old
heavy walls, as the evening bells begin
to lift, lift and fill.

poem notes