Ruins

A spring day oozes through Trastevere. A nun in turquoise sneakers contemplates the stairs. Ragazzi everywhere, the pus in their pimples pushing up like paperwhites in the midday sun. Every hard bulb stirs. The fossilized egg in my chest cracks open against my will. I was so proud not to feel my heart. Waking means being angry. The dead man on the Congo road was missing an ear, which had either been eaten or someone was wearing it around his neck. The dead man looked like this. No, that. Here’s a flock of tourists in matching canvas hats. This year will take from me the hardened person who I longed to be. I am healing by mistake. Rome is also built on ruins.