PoetryMagazine.com Editor's Featured Poet Donna Pucciani

Donna Pucciani
USA

Donna Pucciani , a Chicago-based poet, has published poetry on four continents and in a variety of journals, including Spoon River, The Pedestal, International Poetry Review, ShiChao Poetry, Christian Century, and JAMA. Her work has been translated into Italian, Chinese, and Japanese and she has won awards from the Illinois Arts Council, Poetry on the Lake, and the National Federation of State Poetry Societies. Her fifth and most recent collection is Hanging Like Hope on the Equinox (Virtual Artists Collective)

Outside Rome

life limps along

without crowds and Michelangelo.

Graffiti is the conversation here,

stray dogs, trams, markets

with Moroccan leather and shoes

made in China .

No fountains or miracles

except the pasticceria next door,

where espresso is the dark flower

of morning and an apricot tart

blessed with powdered sugar

the liturgy of the day.

At night, the moon looks on

as ordinary people spill from buses,

flood the broken sidewalks

with footsteps and tired voices,

jingle keys and consonants

hidden in the deep pockets

of vowels.

Trastevere sleeps

with bread as a pillow.

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