Venice and Villa Capuccini by Byron Beynon

A black gondola
sails into Venice
with rain, lightning
and a nervous Claire.
A Sunday afternoon
meeting between
Byron and Shelley,
fourteen hours,
the confessions and suggestions
in a maritime city of beauty and disgust;
south-westwards
villa Capuccini idles
in the summer heat,
as ideas and manuscripts
gather on the brow of a low hill,
events moving towards
a swift summit of sun,
sickness that killed
the aches conceived
in hardened September,
a late child
buried on the Lido beach.

Byron Beynon's work has appeared in Night Garden Journal, Agenda, London Magazine, Poetry Wales, Poetry Ireland Review and Grey Sparrow.  He coordinated the Wales' section of the anthology Fifty Strong (Heinemann). Collections include The Sundial (Flutter Press), Cuffs (Rack Press) and The Echoing Coastline (Agenda Editions).