Free Nice Weather by Frederick Seidel Page A

poems he wrote, and so few dedications.

CIMETIÈRE DU MONTPARNASSE, 12ÈME DIVISION
    I have a friend who has a friend
    Who asked her to place her hand
    And place a flower on Samuel Beckett’s grave
    On his behalf.
    This man, who is in the theater, had corresponded with Sam.
    My friend asked me to join her to do this.
    It seemed reason enough to come to Paris.
    And it was.
    And there, quite a surprise, was Susan Sontag’s grave.
    And now it’s time to get the fuck out
    Of this beautiful pointlessness.

ROME
    I impersonate myself and here I am,
    Prick pointing at the moon, teeth sunk into your calf.
    I ought to warn the concrete that my passion dooms the dam.
    The poem I’m writing looks up at me and starts to laugh.
    Summer! Of course you are! You are my miracle!
    Just now we were in Rome.
    I have to be in Rome with you to be so lyrical—
    Or else it’s noon Alaska time, the Auschwitz hour in Nome.
    At Rockefeller Center, winter in New York, I pause.
    Let’s watch the skaters lark around the rink.
    The worn-out dance floor of ice looks like a blind eye of gauze.
    It’s time to have a rinkside drink and have a little think.
    I thought I’d never reach hydroplaning speeds again.
    It’s Sagaponack and the freezing April Atlantic.
    Three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten …
    It’s about to happen. It’s a feeling not dissimilar to being frantic.
    Oh what a feeling. It’s like America—
    It’s like Italy—with nothing else to compare it to.
    Excitement mounts till la repubblica italiana is isterica!
    Orgasm is an Italian opera aria of bombast and dew.
    As in-your-face as a red Turkish fez
    With a tassel—as hidden as an Israeli agent’s gun—
    â€œI’ll call you back in five minutes,” my vivid Italian girlfriend says
    In English. Does she mean cinque minuti italiani or American?
    In Via Michelangelo Caetani, near the Ghetto, where
    The Red Brigades left Aldo Moro’s body in the trunk of a parked car,
    There’s a plaque. There are flowers. I bow my head. I stare.
    We’ve covered him with a blanket and I’ve shot him ten times so far.

A HISTORY OF MODERN ITALY
    I see Silvio in a yellow slicker
    Jumping up and down in a downpour,
    Sing-songing Rain rain go away,
    Come again another day.
    His fists are clenched.
    His nanny in a nurse outfit is smilingly drenched.
    Silvio Berlusconi is not happy.
    He feels crappy.
    I’m talking to myself again.
    I scroll down Broadway in the rain.
    I’m hidden under an umbrella, but I hope it’s obvious
    I rejoice for Italy, more or less.
    Not exactly talking to myself, more like quiet shouting.
    I’m under a black umbrella spouting
    A fancy accent (but I hate being taken for English). Yo!
    Ooga-Booga says to Bunga Bunga: So long, Silvio!
    We’ve circled to use up fuel
    And now we’re short final.
    There’s the rainy runway.
    President Napolitano of Italy holds out his hand as if to say
    Immortal blue from which no rain can fall
    Fell. How to recover from a stall? Fall!
    Brace for death. For landing.
    Don’t call it death. It’s a matter of rebranding.
    Cassius Clay turning into Muhammad Ali
    Is the model of modernity.
    Silvio Berlusconi is the beau idéal of hilarious iniquity.
    The eurozone trees have rebranded into autumn. Italy is free!
    Or rather Italy is sort of free.
    The catastrophic lyrical elation of Leopardi
    Described his country pityingly.
    Then came Mussolini.
    Duce! Duce! Duce! Adriano Visconti flew into the blue
    In his heroic Macchi C.202
    Like a pearl diver free-diving for pearls,
    Or Berlusconi diving to the bottom for girls.
    Fascist Visconti with his RAF mustache—
    Such dash, such panache!
    It was good to be an ace in World War II,
    And rather better than being a Jew.
    Visconti surrendered to communist partisans at Malpensa airfield—
    Once they’d assured him no air or ground personnel of his would be