fontana Della Api

Fontana Della Api
(The fountain of Bees)



At the corner of Piazza Barberini and Via Vittorio Veneto
I stood waiting for someone who did show up, it was
a warm September day, it had rained in the morning making
the air aromatic, but sensed I had fallen from grace, it was
time to leave Rome.

A horse, whose owner had gone into a bar for a fried sardine
and a glass red of wine came, pulling a cart, to drink water
off the well, when it had had enough I tried to let it drink some
more as it might be hours before it got another drink of water,
but the horse stubbornly refused, ate my flowers instead;
I led the horse back to the bar, but now it was facing the other
way, would the owner notice?

The horse didn’t know nor did I before reading about it in
a guide book that the fountain had been transferred from
the Via Sistina in 1644 (the book didn’t say why) and again
old Bernini had had a hand in its design