Angel in a Wooden Bra / Page 10 of 20


	campo dei miracoli (the field of miracles) beneath the train station in Pisa seven wooden ships lie on their sides in the mud of a silted up sea port 20 feet beneath commuters on the open-air concrete platform. the body of a pregnant woman lies next to sailors lying on swords. the bones of lions still imprisoned in cages. an unknown species of dog. olive oil in clay jars. death came suddenly in a storm. these are the remains of the sea power of Pisa, of the trade with Spain and North Africa which built the duomo, the round baptistry, the camposanto -- the house of the dead filled with soil stolen from the Holy Lands during the Crusades -- and the bell tower they kept building on 80 years after it started to lean because it was built with a shallow foundation over sand. you can't climb up and repeat the experiments on the relative velocities of falling objects because the bell tower no longer defies gravity. it requires 10,000 pound cables and counterweights. we wander away from the only lawn we've seen in Italy to the university where Galileo taught. the crowd at the bar drinking beer behind a yellow neon "Miller Lite" sign. a little noise in a town closed for siesta.

campo dei miracoli (the field of miracles)