A club night at san miniato al monte
By Claudia Vulliamy

Artwork by Isabel Mitchelson
We are gathered here tonight
on ivory floors
in the o-shaped hum of holy light
The bass is syrupy
and dark, waking
stark grotesques on every wall
We are gathered here
to move through thick air
not to see or touch or speak
but to meet a multi-dimensional sound
There are no words, just
thump hum thump hiss
It rushes through your chest
then purposefully onto the next
So shamelessly it touches you that it is unperverted
without hidden intent
It snakes between the pillars of the basilica
echoes down into the crypt
It charges through the blind colonnade
and the beasts who climb the church facade
and the marble lovers in the yard
As the hot harmony ascends
and the pillars melt and bend
the arches invite you to kneel
Heavy with the altar's wine
you are lost, rising limbless
cowering before the sanctuary
at San Miniato al Monte