University of Northern Iowa

In the Cemetery of the Poor Clares, Castello Aragonese, Ischia, in ItalyAuthor(s): Stephen GibsonSource: The North American Review, Vol. 291, No. 2, The National Poetry Month Issue (Mar. -Apr., 2006), p. 20Published by: University of Northern IowaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25127560 .

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NAR

STEPHEN GIBSON

In the Cemetery of the Poor Clares, Castello Aragonese, Ischia, in Italy

In twin latrines, the corpses of these nuns would drain into vases.

How can someone so despise the flesh

they will watch their dead sisters sit

in a communal latrine, and as the corpses

drain into vases underneath the seats

pray not only for their incorruptible souls

but for the resurrection of their bodies?

Imagine this confined space?their bodies

like dogs you've seen beside roads, flesh

ready to burst as you drove by, souls

long since departed in such heat. You sit

up and look hard, and your kid in her car seat

in back asks what you're looking at. Corpses,

you think, and keep silent?swollen corpses?

and you can describe the blackened bodies

you've seen in newsreels, the pilot in his seat

waiting to press the button that barbecues flesh, and you won't think another thought as you sit

there driving because in the back seat is your soul

speaking out loud to you, asking whether the soul

lives on after death because you have seen corpses?

grandparents, when your parents told you to sit

up straight and stop fidgeting?and then their bodies

in the suit or dress you picked out. The flesh is weak. That is the way of all flesh?or a cement seat

in a fortress that's now a museum, its cement seats

curiosities for visitors. Donne wrote of the souls

of lovers reaching out to embrace while the flesh

remained separate and apart. Did these sisters' corpses somehow do the same? By despising their bodies

in life, by chastising the flesh and making it sit

in silence, not at meals only but when they'd sit

in prayer, or alone praying together in seats?

singing their Creator's praises so that their bodies

thrilled unto ecstasies that filled, and emptied, their souls? was this their secret? Does such devotion to corpses

(gathering liquid remains into vases) demean flesh?

Medieval fathers would sit stone-faced as their souls were led away, ultimately to take their seats as corpses?

daughters whose bodies never experienced the flesh.

W. T. PFEFFERLE

Tattoos

The guy with the gut and the tattoos

is telling me about the Black Hills of South Dakota. He likes to append all his sentences with "man,"

like he's in some circa '67 movie.

"Got a big deal brewing," he says, "with some buddies.

We're going to paint rocks and sell them to tourists.

It'll be classic."

He says his name is Ed.

He's got a green garbage bag for a carry-on.

It's got yellow handles though.

"I wake up every morning with nothing to do, and when I go to bed I'm about halfway through.

You get me, man?"

"My buddies love it up there. A traffic jam is like ... like ... three cars!"

Ed puts his sunglasses on and flips his ponytail around,

checking the rubber band.

"Had the tail since junior high. Made for some interesting conversations,

as I bet you can imagine."

Ed's plane is called and he gives me a salute.

He leaves behind a smell of plastic and

aftershave and two sticks of Juicy Fruit gum that a little kid comes by and chews

long after Ed's history.

20 NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW March-April 2006

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