Gareth Roi Jones's poem "The 1000 Ways to San Marco Piazza"

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                                                                            Piazza San Marco with the Basilica (1720) by Canaletto



Gareth Roi Jones is a member of the Dandylion Collective, a small writers' group based in South Australia. In 2014, he co-edited the Friendly Street Poets Anthology 38 The Infinite Dirt ... & again in 2020, titled, simply, Q (you remember the weirdness of that year, you get why) ... as well as judging the Saeta Awards. In 2019, he had two chapbooks published; The Soft Hummus of Shleep & The Loam of Our Dreams; in 2012, a solo collection, Gunyah. 


The 1000 Ways to San Marco Piazza


my love lives in Dorsoduro ; I, in Castello ; & every evening ; she promises to meet me ;

in San Marco’s Piazza at sunset ; she says if we find each other there ; our love will last

if I were more talented ; I would write a postmodern novel ; telling of the thousand ways ;

we never meet ; a short chapter ; a paragraph; even just a line, or single word ; about

how my unerring ability ; to lose my way ; dooms me ; every alternative route I choose

the one where I see her on another Ponte, chase her, see her on other Pontes, but I

never get closer ; the one where every Calle is a dead end ; the where I find a letter on

the cobblestones from her to another ; the one where I fall in ; the one with a Calle so

narrow my shoulders reach each wall which close in till I am wedged tight; the one where

I meet another who might in fact be the one true love of my life

nights thick with the stink of summer tourists ; nights where the waters are still obsidian ;

nights when I don’t want to leave the house ; nights when I am dying to ; muggy shirts

sticky nights ; wet winter nights

& maybe ; one night ; when I least expect ; I will arrive ; & she ; & I ; will meet


© 2022 Gareth Roi Jones


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