Ode to Polignano A Mare

this city on a rock — it stands in the glory of returning sunsets and waves. untouched by erosion, changed only by

the passing time the passing generations the passing visitors

but perhaps it is the city that transforms them — leaving them longing for the sounds and tastes of Adriatic waters and the array of white terraces bathing in hues of orange, pink and blue in contrast with the hues of their skin embraced by warm air.

I am one of them.

a visitor ready to swear that in Polignano the sun knows different tricks — it plays, it teases the body — makes it its own so that somehow you submit. more than that — you begin to sing songs in a language you don’t know but it all translates through a smile — your only way to hold onto this dream on a cliff

when you descend back onto the ground of the mundane.