A piece inspired by late-night prowling around the back street cobble-stoned mews in Sardinia, terrorizing the little lizards and whatnot

From A Stirring at Dusk

Santa Teresa De Gallura

There is green, there is black -
evening needs little colour
to impress,
evening’s not always the chameleon’s whipping boy,
I watch trees dip like emeralds,
dangling moon and sun
through cat-piss streets
where dogs soon take charge,
and every song is a newborn tongue
tracing sounds from forgotten lives,
be it blotches that splinter space
between sea and night,
or the foggy collage of Bonifacio
soon to strike,
on the hill where people made illicit talk—
in Gallurese, Sardo, a canvas whispered on
sky-drenched script,
I saunter the greenest leaves, my shadow seared on blackened
lanes of night,
I write with ink moon filled their souls with -
the purple clouds are the storm of words,
where Jesus’ blood was tattooed by sunset

(c) John Doyle