Latin Pig
Greetings, beneficiary!
There’s the “ick” of St.
Petersburg. And then
there’s the “ugh” of St.
Petersburg. Lucy lives
in St. Petersburg, but
she is not to be con-
fused with the one in
the sky with diamonds.
No, but she has immeas-
urable amounts of gold.
During the warm season,
and sometimes during
the not-so-warm season,
the gold cascades down
the mountaintops that
surround Lucy’s daringly
hip (for Russia, you know)
mansion. So, yes, lots of
gold. Urp! And lots of
icky sky. Ugh! But the
golden icing on the peaks
of the summits surround-
ing her dainty mansion,
and the gold itself, seem
to be the only pollution
in Russia’s Amsterdam
(however, I will always
prefer Venice). The pol-
lution wraps the city into
a singularity, so it can be
stuck into a sentence all
the more appropriately,
all the more violently,
with the common sway
of the boughs, the overly-
ornate parlor parquetry,
the kitchen cabinets that
are so often open, hanging
limply like the lower part
of the human body around
a broken bone, a leg bone,
as it sways ever so slightly,
to and fro (for purposes of
this missile, we can deny
the pain of it all; there’s
enough in the beautifully
wrapped city of St. Peters-
burg, whose inhabitants
seem endlessly enraptured
by the sunken rooms in
their own homes; rooms
we’d probably call dens.
In fact, “Down with the
dens!” is the somewhat
unofficial motto of the city
of St. Petersburg. A den
with an extra e is of course
Eden, after all. And always
he sways and she sways,
in unison, in solidarity, it
seems with the bows. He
sways, she sways. And do
I ever love it when you sway
on your uniquely bland (for
St. Petersburg, anyway)
porch-swing (also unique.
in that same way) in the
indelibly heartwarming
city of St. Petersburg.
