While In Italy
A poem by Andrea Potos

While In Italy
Lucca

We had no map, wandering
narrow, curving lanes, we found
an old weaving shop that bore
my mother’s name la tela di Penelope.
She hadn’t been gone one year yet still
I felt her beside me, passing the gold-
warmed walls of towers and houses
that reached so tall above us, with clotheslines
strung from window to window.  
We walked under sheets and tablecloths,
blouses and towels and trousers; 
I looked up to find a Nonna watching them
waving in the Tuscan air,  perched
like an angel at her sill.  

About the Author:

Andrea Potos is the author of several poetry collections, most recently Her Joy Becomes (Fernwood Press), Marrow of Summer and Mothershell, both from Kelsay Books.  A new collection entitled Belonging Songs is forthcoming from Fernwood Press in early 2025.  Andrea’s poems appear widely in print and online, most recently in One Art, Braided Way, The Sun, The Midwest Quarterly, Potomac Review, Spiritus, Poem , How to Love the World and The Path to Kindness, both anthologies from Storey Publishing.  She lives in Madison, Wisconsin. 

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