I’m riding in a cab from the outskirts
to the center of Rome. The driver has
no English. I have only a few phrases
from the guide book, Quando
il treno va? Que Costa? We idle
in bundled lines. The museum
closes in an hour. Exhausts, horns
and shouting surround us,
but the silence inside the cab
as thick as the traffic outside.
When the light changes,
everyone rushes to the next wait
a few dozen metres ahead.
I say to myself, I think, Bitte,
mach schnell. The driver hears this,
says, Sprechen Sie Deutsch? When
I answer, Ya, ein bisschen Deutsch.
Sind Sie amerikaner? he asks.
Again Ya. And, Sind Sie italiener?
It is his turn to say, Ya. Our eyes
meet in the rear view mirror
and we laugh. We drive like this,
the American tourist talking
German to the Italian cabdriver.
I tell Rosario I learned German
thirty years before when I was
a sholdier stationed in Germany.
He drove cab in Zurich for three
years thirty years ago.
We toast each other in three
languages. He asks what is at
the address I gave him in writing.
I tell him it is a museum for
an English poet who, being a true
gentleman, left England to die in Rome.
Rosario likes that, even if he doesn’t
know it is not quite true, and says,
“Those English! Most people come

*

to Rome for amore, but not the English.
They are so cold.” I ask why he used
the Italian for love and not the German.
He says, ”Liebe  is a good word, but
amore is Rome.” German on both
our tongues is rusty and we blurt
out phrases as they come to us.
I try to tell him of another
English poet who came
to Italy with his English bride,
also a poet, because they knew
Rome is the place for love.
He tells me L'amore è Roma
is the phrase. I thank him, tell him
the bride is buried in Firenze, that
I am going there tomorrow.
When I leave the cab, we wish
each other only good luck,
gutes Glück, buona fortuna.

Rome 10-13-03