View of Miranda, Italy — Emma Sywyj
YOUR OLD BEDROOM WINDOW
— Craig Martin Getz
The black-and-white aerial photograph of your town
was taken from the height of summer eagles,
the highest of storks, their nearly useless legs
dangling over fascist Spain, from above
corn and sugar beet fields, fruit orchards, to the south
of your old bedroom window;
just enough thread
poking through the eye of a needle.
It was a sunny day; the shadows a myriad
of darker triangles and rectangles just to the left
of the otherwise jigsaw collection of upright buildings:
from the farming warehouses on the lower edge
to the Arabic fortress castle, its crown of battlements,
and the Catholic church smack dab against it
at the top of the gentle flood-free rise
the old town still clings to.
One winter morning, all of our fathers came singing
wake-up songs, didn't they? They would open the curtains
and point to the snow covering the rooftops of our hometown
like a miracle, their arms around our shoulders.