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Ode to Orvieto

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Ode to Orvieto

by David Eugene Perry

San Giuseppe Day: March 19, 2016

Unique.

An overused word meant to stand:

alone.

Teenagers playing 

kick the can without appendage digital digitalis. 

Tourists and talkers, 

locals and lookers, 

paving the stones of sacred and profane with their dreams and their drudgeries. 

Youth poised on historic fountains; 

joyously earned fonts of wrinkled legacy sitting at cafe tables smoking and thinking and just…

sitting.

It is San Giuseppe Day.

All around: professions. 

Yesterday, processions. 

Today traditional breads broken in gooey camaraderie. 

Cathedrals in glorious effusions of timeless edification. 

The occasional car waits patiently for the more than occasional parade of cats, dogs, baby strollers and elegantly elderly signoras navigating Ferrari mobility vehicles between the Corso and the magnificent awaiting ruins of San Rocca.

Unique.

Three bells from la Torre del Moro: 5:45pm in Piazza del Popolo. 

I balance my table with folded napkins.

Double cheeked kisses. 

Serendipitous meeting misses. 

Another glass of Classico because —

Why not?

Tomorrow. We do it again.

Unico.

Orvieto.