The Wading Pool BY GEORGE BILGERE The toddlers in their tadpole bodies, with their squirt guns and snorkels, their beautiful mommies and inflatable whales, are still too young to understand that this is as good as it gets.
Austin, Texas June 7, 2015 photo by Alice-Catherine Jennings
A day at the neighborhood pool screams summer. Everyone’s in a good mood. The kids are electric; the parents can chill; and the singlets’ skin glow.
Born in 1951, George Bilgere has been called the baby boomer’s poet. You can watch a video of Bilgere talking about his poetry here.
Not only sheepmen, weavers, craftsmen
Lie under the Cotswald turf…
Seuso Hunting Plate in the Hungarian Parliament Building Photo by Derzsi Elekes Andor – Own work CC by SA 3.0
The story behind the Seuso Treasure, fourteen Roman-era silver worth perhaps as much as $200 million, is prime material for a blockbuster movie. Discovered more than 30 years ago, this treasure has been involved in a series of sales and acquisitions, illegal intrigue and possibly three murders.
Lake Balaton, July 2014
When Sotheby’s put this treasure up for sale in New York in 1990, three countries came forward to claim ownership: Croatia, Hungary, and Lebanon.
Archeological features, however, indicate that the silver most likely was part of a 4th century Roman Villa in the Balaton region of modern day Hungary. (“Contributions to the Archeology of the Seuso Treasure” by Zsolt Visy)
Part now of the upland the the tools they used…
Roman Ruins Lake Balaton Region, July 2014
Early this year, seven pieces of this ancient Roman silver treasure were repatriated to Budapest with the logistical help of the Hungarian Counter Terrorism Center.
Penates and coloured pavements, ivory pins
And fingers that held them—warm brown mesh
Under the roots and the rabbit gins,
Note the almond
Tree overmuch with fruit. The almond
Pressed is oil sweet.
From the the ancient city of Aquincum,
the borders of Pannonia, across the limes,
the limits of the Rome, onward
to the Carpathian Basin of Pécs,
we traveled—
thirty-some seekers
of the ruins.
…Do you hear?
That pulse?
A whirl of images
the press of heat
the cool of blue
and the tree
of almonds…
dropping nuts
like bones.
