An American abroad has been grist for the literary mill, and Italy in particular has always held its attractions, as seen in work by poets from James Wright to former Santa Barbara Poet Laureate David Starkey (Circus Maximus and You, Caravaggio).
Now another former S.B. PL, Paul Willis, has turned to Italy for inspiration in his recently published chapbook Orvieto (Solum Literary Press). For a short book, it takes us on a deep dive into this historic, artful town in Umbria perched dramatically on a rock cliff (or, as Wikipedia puts it, “The flat summit of a large butte of volcanic tuff”).
Willis, an emeritus professor of English at Westmont, began work on the poems in the collection during visiting teaching stints in 2021 and 2024 as part of the Gordon-in-Orvieto program. He candidly admits how new this setting is to him, winning us over easily with his wide-eyed acceptance of the world. Typical of his often sly craft, he opens the book with “Shutters”— this is a book about seeing — and by the poem’s end, he has transformed himself into a songbird. Which he remains, tunefully bringing us the agony of history (especially World War II), the ecstasy of art (many poems are ekphrastic), and the spirituality of faith. For the latter, no one considers angels and saints more humanely, in particular, poor St. Julian. You don’t have to be Christian in the slightest to be moved by Julian’s fate, as Willis tenderly relates it.
Of course, there’s plenty of religious imagery — it’s Italy, for Chrissakes — but Willis is wise enough to find the funny in faith, as in this vividly described passage describing a statue in the church of Santa Maria dei Servi:
We know it is Jesus, though, because he
is wearing a spoked halo as big and strong
as a steering wheel on a UPS delivery truck.
Which means he has something to deliver.
That out-of-nowhere simile of Big Brown, you can’t unsee it; something miraculously makes sense. Sort of like faith. And while it’s a laugh line, your chortle deepens with the kicker about what Jesus is here to deliver. Willis can have his fun and proselytize, too.
Readers of Willis’s work — he’s published eight full-length poetry collections — will be pleased to know his love for nature isn’t abandoned in this book, no matter how many Etruscan tombs and Catholic reliquaries it explores. An inveterate hiker, you know he’s going to traipse the Umbrian countryside and report back. Turns out even with humans mucking things up — those World War II poems singe the soul — nature patiently will wait us out. For, as Willis observes walking the ring around the tufa that is Orvieto:
Hello? Hello? A broken box of telephone lines
is plugged into the side of the rock.
Inside, a nest of twigs—
a little desk for the operator.
Willis will read from Orvieto and hold a book signing at Chaucer’s Books (3321 State St.) at 6 p.m. on Thursday, March 12. For more information, see chaucersbooks.com.
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