Modern Love Lxxxii (Write Someone's Name With Clouds) Poem by Liberatore Suffoletta

There are seventy balconies in that hotel
Seventy balconies and not a single flower…
All those inhabitants, what’s the matter?
Do they all hate perfume? Do they hate color?

Even naked stone overwhelms with its sadness
The blank balconies infuse with their gloom
Doesn’t a single love-struck woman live there?
Not even one lonely poet demented by illusions?

Doesn’t someone want to see through the window
A miniature replica of a garden?
See roses climbing up along the white stone
A hibiscus blooming against the black iron?

If they don’t love plants, they will never love birds;
They’ll know nothing of music, rhyming, or love.
They’ll never hear a kiss or a piano
Or write someone’s name with clouds
Seventy balconies and not a single flower!