IMPROVISATION #123
ALDA MARINI'S MOMENTS
(1931 -2009)

Voices from echoes
in Milan's dusty street
from a genealogy of generations
alights in her Word
into vibrations from Judah's hills
plays as you listen
with a powerful dream
bathing and immersed
by a cistern of fountains
with wood sprites
and tiny bluebirds
you walk by the wood
rejoicing from inner peace
with fates of your survival
in no choice death throes
as water drops in the city
a libretto from a music critic
who passes over your city arrival
you know you are a guest
to visit in malevolent times
of the strange outsources
by the chance of river waters
as your maternal melody
of folk music flows
takes hold you are drawn
by the cloudy riverbank
as a daughter of resistance
there is blood by the cemetery
from a better revelation
of crimes devised
in the shadowy night outlines
of madness from heavy shades
of shut-in doors
stormy sounds as arpeggios
from a canary
encased now in a cage
by fallen branches
after spring floods
Alda Marini's range
in warm letters
a child thanks us
for lucid moments
to outlast her century
in the radiant snow.