'Paintings trawl time like nets, catching what stories they can, and ruins are the ground you walk.' These prose poems take the reader through a gallery of European art, notionally situated in Rome, but only fully constituted in these pages. These works explore modes of representation and the eddying connections between language and visual imagery. They explore human history and culture, and history's connections to the present. Although this book is made of words, it will conduct you on an unforgettable gallery tour.