Punt

 

Punt

 

You don’t remember

if there was a mission

to sanction some torpid skyscraper demolition.

Thought more of a bridge-builder,

good chap—

on cue, your masses rise and clap.

But as for that,

nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition.

And all your blue-grey pigeons

crap in the square.

Could be St Mark’s—

don’t remember, don’t care—

or St Peter’s Colonnade flung wide,

a place to embrace,

suck lemonade through straws and hide.

 

Meanwhile, the chapel of Sixtus

just witnessed something rictus,

and your likely cardinals take a punt.

Newspapers briefly run

with all the sex scandals under the sun,

pap at those shuffling bums—

then switch off and yawn

at a grand guignol game of musical pews,

all suits you, sir—oo, oo—suits you.