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Natasha Anne Kelleher

VENICE UN VOLTA LA SERENISSIMO

Updated: Oct 27, 2022

Venice fluid city of old once stood alone

Amid it's silky watery domain

Then a bridge was built in 1849

Linked the Isle to all of Italy

Its future irrevocably set in motion

People descending like worker ants in droves

Tevenia Bridge the second largest

Purveyor of inquisitive hurried feet

Forced the sleepy lulling isle

To gradually at first imperceptibly then

Unrecognizably to transform

Into a bustling tourist destination

Alas never again a quiet meditative cultural retreat


It became Italy's opulent floating azure blue and sanded city

Palaces on tenuous plinths, Courtesan's Houses, galore

Where once masked balls courted by Byron and Casanova

Their barely seen eyes ever noted

Hid their identity along with their secrets and games

Danced pranced and dallied

Making free love without rules

Until all wine drunk energy waned then spent

Along those candlelit winding passages at night

Lovers would wend to find a secret place

To indulge their bodies of ecstatic delight

The men just enjoying their needs being met

But women hoping to create that elusive bond

By which men if not in love did all to abscond


Aqua Blue Grand Canal coursing veinlike

Through its watery streets decked with jetties to alight

Tourists flock intrigued like a moth to an errant flame

To set free their imagination in visionary flight

Let it breath live expand and soar so bright


Gondolas with a handsome rowers wearing

Jaunty black caps with red and white striped shirts

Stream along romantic couples to their sheer delight

Under pretty arched bridges in smaller canals

Makes them shriek with awe delight awe and laughter

Finding themselves in the inspiring St Mark's Square

With gothic church St Mark's Basilica and piazzas adorn each side

Smartly dressed orchestras playing in cafes

Under gently billowing cream canopies

The lover's where they are left alone

In peace for stolen kisses and love laden stares

Until rescued again into their black sleek vessel

Continue their journey of lovers treats

Such sweet memories wherein their future

Will once again lucidly be retrieved

To once again remember yet again to astound


Eyes aloft stroking each others arms

Capturing the views and ambiance

Renaissance buildings magnificent churches still majestic

Steeped in times and events past

To afford historians their rhetoric

To remember to uplift again

In perhaps darker and less happy times

Yet still the world continues to incrementally descend

Grinding down this unique paradise citadel

Its ancient foundations and palaces standing

On tenuously less firm foundations and ground

Will this most astounding astonishing city

Be in the midst of its so needed rescue

Or will it slowly and imperceptibly sink

Leaving this tribute of man's ingenuity

A monolith of Italian virtuosity and artistic flair

Teetering at the behest of man's inquisitiveness

Of the city holding a lair of names

"La Dominante" "Queen of the Adriatic" "City of Masks"

"City of Water" "City of Bridges", "The Floating City"

Yet man and nature holds the future of Venice

In its thoughtless curious ever tightening grasp

Yet there is now hope to save it from sinking at last....

Venice In Peril shall be a tragedy Finally thwarted and permanently consigned to the past......



Copyright All Rights Reserved Natasha Anne Kelleher December 2019











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