I'm A Citizen Of ...

by Eric Lucas

“So, how does it feel to be in your homeland?”

My wife, Leslie, looks at me inquisitively.

Tindari by Leslie ForsbergWe’re visiting Tindari, Sicily, where the Black Madonna of Tindari hangs in a cool-stone basilica on an olive-scrub headland overlooking the Tyrrhenian Sea. Beside the Madonna is an equally ebony Christ hanging on a crucifix. Up the road is a theater used by Greeks and Romans; stone seats persist on a rocky hillside, 2,000 years after they were first set down.

“She is known as the ‘Black Madonna of the Orient’,” our Sicilian guide, Lita, explains about the sepia-hued sculpture in the basilica’s huge bronze altar. “That means ‘from the east.’ In this case, Byzantium. So many, many people have come through Sicily over the centuries.”

And many have left.

“I’m Sicilian,” I tell Lita. She raises her eyebrows, looks me up and down. I hope I pass inspection: oxhide skin; walnut eyes; bones like the old olive trees nearby. She nods.

“One quarter Sicilian,” I clarify. “My great-grandparents came from a village above Palermo.

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Ghosts of Soldiers at Anzio

by Shirley B. Moskow 

My father told me about Anzio. He showed me a yellowed newspaper with heavy, black 64-point headlines from World War II. “A-N-Z-I-O. What does it mean?” I asked.

“It’s a beach in Italy,” he said.  “My best friend died there in the war.”

That snippet of memory surfaced recently when my husband, Richard, and I visited Ostia, the seaside town south of Rome. We had toured the remarkable ruins at Ostia Antica, saw the sentinel tower designed by Michaelangelo, and admired the colorful art deco buildings lining the boulevard. On the last day of our trip, we were driving to the shore for a romantic sunset stroll along Italy’s only dune beach when we spied the sign: Anzio 37 km. 

The name resonated. Impulsively, we decided to forego the beach and head towards Anzio. Our guide book offered no information, but I’d read Gerard M. Devlin’s book, Paratrooper!  The Battle of Anzio, code name Shingle, supported the operation to liberate Rome, 30 miles to the north. In the early morning of January 22, 1944, under cover of darkness, a convey of 374 Allied ships entered the harbor. With surprise on their side, troops quickly established a beachhead three miles deep and 15 miles wide before the Germans who occupied the territory were alerted.

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Searching for Shakespeare

by Jean Kepler Ross

Venice. I was waiting for a traghetto gondola to ferry me across the Grand Canal when I spied a building plaque indicating that the palazzo in front of me was the home of Desdemona, the tragic heroine of Shakespeare’s “Othello.” I didn’t have time to check it out on that trip, but it fired my imagination and I did some research. Desdemona’s home is traditionally set at Palazzo Contarini Fasan, a private home, but now I must go back to see what I can of this home with the plaque. I’ve already been to the Doge’s Palace on Saint Mark’s Square, the Rialto Bridge and the Jewish Ghetto to breathe in the scenes of “The Merchant of Venice.”

from the Wikimedia Commons filesI bonded with William Shakespeare at a young age. I got to play Katherine, or Kate, in our high school production of “The Taming of the Shrew” - a fun and boisterous role - and later played Miranda in a university production of “The Tempest.” Through my exposure to his dramas, I learned to love the language of the Bard.

These early impressions follow me on my travels and when I have a chance to explore sites or works related to Shakespeare, I jump. I’ve been to the Old Globe Theater in San Diego’s Balboa Park to see “Macbeth” (a fine production, but it was my birthday and by the end of the show, there were bodies and prop heads on stakes all over the stage – a bit heavy for a celebration) and to many plays at the renowned Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s Elizabethan stage in Ashland.

On one trip to Europe, I made a pilgrimage to Stratford-upon-Avon and saw Anne Hathaway’s cottage and Shakespeare’s house, but missed out on seeing a play in Shakespeare’s home town as the productions were all sold out. I made do with a performance of Tom Stoppard’s “Rozencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead” at the Old Vic Theatre in London where I saw the minor characters from “Hamlet” star in their parallel side story. In Denmark, I stopped by Elsinore Castle to see where the Danish royal family used to live and imagined Hamlet pacing the ramparts, deciding whether to be or not to be. My strongest memory is of a torture device in the dungeon and I could see how easy it would be to be melancholy there.

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Suddenly Seeking Sunshine

by Jean Kepler Ross

I was trimming my geraniums the other day, preparing to bring them inside for the winter.  As I worked on my plants out in the garden, I appreciated the warmth of the sun on that beautiful fall day and thought of a woman I encountered once in Siena, Italy, on another sunny fall day.

photo via Flickr.comMy husband and I were on our honeymoon, a five-week tour through Italy.  We arrived in Siena by train and found our way to the plaza where the famous Palio horse race is held twice a year.  We ordered lunch at an outdoor café and my husband went to look for lodging while I guarded the suitcases (I loved that job).

All of a sudden, an elderly woman with white hair and crinkled skin sat down in my husband’s chair.  I tried to explain to her that that was my husband’s chair and could she please move.  The woman just said, “sole.” My Italian isn’t very deep, but I gathered she was enjoying the sun.  I didn’t know what to do, but I again told her that that chair was for my husband and we were having lunch.  She said to me, “He can sit over there,” in English and kept sitting next to me with her face held up to the sun.

I am usually a peaceful person but I felt so upset with this woman that I actually felt like pushing her out of the chair.  What kind of manners were these? We were customers at the café and she was intruding on our romantic fantasy. After indignantly repeating that that was my husband’s chair, I gave up and the two of us sat next to each other quietly taking in the sun.

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Final Move Home

by Janet Eigner

Mother’s left the building again to search
for her husband, a year ago passed on,
says, "Do you know where Len’s gone?"
"Our charter...we can’t
guard her safely on this side,"
worries the director,
"Call in our movers."

We creep along the palm-shaded sidewalk
the pristine lawns, behind the scrawny,
muscled couple toting
the plaid sofa-bed, her queen mattress
sturdy chair with arms to push herself upright
cherry china cabinet to hold the proud evidence
they’d shed the immigrants’ threadbare cloth:
Lalique crystal sculpture, a sixty year collection:
Sister takes the small dove.
I warm the smaller owl in my palm

across the parking lot that divides each
past day lived in her vivid suite,
front door open to clan and friends,

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