Rome

urbs Roma manet semperque manebit

(the city of Rome remains, and will always remain)

Photograph: Temple of Faustina Palatine Hill

You search in Rome for Rome? Oh traveller!

In Rome itself there is no room for Rome,

a corpse is all its churches put on show,

the Aventine is its own mound and tomb.

There, where the Palatine once towered and reigned,

are medals once ruined by the hands of time,

they show how more was lost to chance and time,

than Hannibal or Caesar could consume.

The Tiber flows still, but its current guards,

a city that has fallen in its grave –

each wave’s a woman tearing at her breast.

Oh Rome! From all your beauty, all your grandeur,

whatever once was firm has fled…what once

was fugitive maintains its permanence.

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