The 86-year old poet encounters the Italian police and gets creative.

Lawrence Ferlinghetti searched out the house his immigrant father was born in, in a small town near Milan:

I rang the bell and tried to see into the lobby. People came to the door and were very hostile. They called the police. A car zooms up, and two poliziotti jumped out and asked for my papers and kept me standing there for three-quarters of an hour.

It's not quite Bush's fault.

They mistook you for a burglar?

There's a climate of fear and paranoia since 9/11, and in this country it was generated by Bush.

But you can't possibly blame President Bush for fear and paranoia in northern Italy.

It's the same with Silvio Berlusconi in Italy. Is it true that Bush believes that anyone caught reading books should be banned from government?

That's such a flaky, California thing to say.

I made it up.

Ah, poetry! You can say what you want!