I will be going on my first great trip.
\nA voyage over the ocean.
\nOver the brooding Atlantic,
\ninto the south latitude of Europe,
\nto arrive in Rome.
\nI am going where some of the blood
\nin my veins once flowed.
\nBlood now as varied as the tides
\nof the sea.
\nOlder even than the eternal city,
\nwith its dead Colosseum,
\nand drapes tattered and torn.<\/p>\n
Oh if only I were young again.
\nIf I could be surprised,
\nsee faces in rains,
\ntouch mosaics unscarred by time,
\nwalk on the banks of the Tiber
\nand say, I am the first human here.
\nI will go north then into France,
\nsee chateaus,
\nsee the pale enchantment of Paris,
\nand go away buried by gardens and streets.
\nThen onto London,
\nhearing my language,
\nmusing at the city\u2019s grayness,
\nlonging to return to the relative emptiness
\nof Ohio.<\/p>\n
Yet, perhaps,
\nI will not see what I expect to see,
\nor hear what I\u2019ve been led to believe.
\nMy parochial soul sensing the new
\nand vibrant,
\nlike the shore
\nlittered with treasure after a storm.
\nI don\u2019t know.
\nI will not see the grave of my brother\u2019s bones,
\nor walk alone down avenues of trees,
\nor feel the wind
\nrush through my hair in the Alps.<\/p>\n
It is a school outing,
\na camp trip,
\na stroll through a museum,
\nunless something comes my way,
\nextraordinary faces,
\na cellar full of ghosts,
\na remembrance of the past.
\nOr my heart telling me,
\nhome in Ohio
\nis the most beautiful of countries,
\nwhere in the end,
\nmy journey will take me,
\namid ordinary sounds and smells,
\nand people
\nI know as well as my hand. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I will be going on my first great trip. A voyage over the ocean. Over the brooding Atlantic, into the south latitude of Europe, to…<\/p>\n