Morning exercise, to keep balance

function, mobility, so routine

automatic count and staring at wall art

 

Each a memory, today, Giotto

long loved and long taught

to children, his lumpy landscapes

 

His frescoes re-learning realism

after Byzantine iconography

mountains so clearly tables and chairs

 

Under sheets and the angels’ flying skirts

fuzzing out to show motion but faces

and hands and arms alive, bodies under cloth

 

And all flaked-away-with-age frescoes

rich colors lost to time. this print pulled

from a book and framed for my memory

 

This morning of a long-ago drizzly day

in Assisi, his frescoes crowded together    

on the cathedral’s dank walls, St. Francis

 

I remember a gray sky and hills, a climb

later heard of an earthquake and damage

and still regret my so scant memory

 

And two more trips to Italy but no return

there for more time and attention

than tours and youth allow

 

Not long ago I read a life of the man

a busy one, a large school of helpers

a stable family and many commissions

 

Then there is the clear innocence

of his works, the rounded cheeks

the angels’ busy comings and goings

 

I end my morning count, move on to other tasks

without stopping to look more closely

but thanking my walls for holding old friends