One strides widely, pivoting
on narrow hips; the other
scampers tiptoe.

At this point
they are passing the dead center
of the piazza , a waterless
fountain whose grey nymphs
pantomime their rhythms: one girl
in red jackboots, the other
in green stockings.

A pair of jeans and a skirt
and the fusty flounces of the sculpture
are all I know in this burnt-out
noon of blank colonnades; their arms,
seemingly twined, are a white shimmer.
Their heads are ablaze; they could
be bared from the waist up.

I lean out
blinded, groping for the shutter,
and tug the darkness around me
like a cage.

My eyelids blossom
as their laughter splashes on me.