Ilona Martonfi’s most recent poem to appear here was “Elegy for Apu” (July 2018).
The stone people of Pompeii
By Ilona Martonfi
Stealing its daylight
ash cools, solidifies
begins to fall
scoria, pumice lapilli
buried under Vesuvius
some lie crawling along cobbles
some sit against tufa walls
others hold each other
among stubble of fig trees
24 August 79 AD
making it night
some seek the god
of the mountain
many run to the sea.
Flat round bread still in mud oven,
this place, where stands a vineyard
and there are others who walk or stop;
in the way they stand at the door
in the way they shout.