J.D. McClatchy

Late Afternoon, Rome
July 02, 2001

Down the street, on the path to the oratory, the stations of the cross—huge bronze slabs, their ordinary agonies modernized to poses on a fashion runway—have been wired shut. A river of swallows sheers off course again Around airlocked spurs of warmth or chill. The sun is out late, panning for gold in the silt of our ochre upper floors. Everything is looking up for a change. Isn't that white capsule on the blue tablecloth the daily jumbo jet?