Weekly
newsreel in black and white, and the lack of color makes the scene less awful, all the other authorities are there on the stand for the occasion: the Minister of the Interior, the Defense Minister, a general weighed down by all the medals on his chest, the cardinal, maybe even two cardinals, the band with their plumes; next Sunday this solemn ceremony of homeland heroism will be shown in all the movie theaters in Italy, or at least in the big cities, before that gripping American movie where shesays that after all, tomorrow is another day, with that blood-red sunset in the background … and that
Incom Weekly
newsreel is historical, because younger generations have to know that what we have here is a national hero being decorated, yes, and he was really the one who performed this act of heroism, but that isn’t him, he’s like the unknown soldier, he represents all Italians, even we presidents and generals who weren’t in the Resistance, he represents us all, because the Italians were never fascists, and we recognize ourselves in him, the Italians always fought against fascism, always, they never dreamed of being fascists, not the Italians … I was the one dreaming, Tristano thinks, I wasn’t fighting against anyone, the fascists never existed, they were all in my imagination … the crooked president comes straight toward him accompanied by a high official who carries the war cross on a silver platter, they’re all banded together, Tristano; there’s no escape, Tristano thinks, now I’ll run away, that dawn back then I didn’t run away, I stayed behind that boulder and held on to my submachine gun, but now I’ll run away, it’s now or never, run, Tristano, run, or in a little while you’ll be a hero to these people, their equal, and it will all be over, irreversible … Writer, open the window, throw it wide open, I want to feel the cool of the evening, because the evening is dear to me when it comes, did they teach you that poem in school?, you must have had some nobody teacher who taught you that one, Tristano could have used some cool himself; instead he was sweating, the heat was unbearable, open my window, writer, let the cool night in, ah, night, it’s night that should be praised, far morethan evening, but it takes guts to praise the night, because the night brings dreams, and often nightmares, and it’s hard to face your nightmares, harder than facing the Nazis, that’s when you really see if you’re a hero; now, please let me be, I want to see if I can sleep.
I knew it was her, even when she was just a figure on the horizon, a bug, because I could make out those familiar, ample hips like an amphora vase where I’d laid my hands and my body; to the left, on the hill, were two Ionic columns, of course I knew they were really the towers from my window, but the painter who’d created this scene, who paints dreams, had transformed these towers into two Ionic columns, and little by little, getting closer, her legs also seemed like two columns, and a delicate vine climbed up to cover her pubis, and he wondered if she hadn’t become a tree, though the tree was moving, he was in his shroud, in the middle of this room that was flung wide open to the countryside, it was an idea of a room and inside this idea of a room was an olive grove that could only be the grove of Delphi, because the trunks were so gnarled and ancient, they could only be those of Delphi, the places they’d passed through in their life dancing dances with immemorial movements though not a trace remains, to the sound of a reed flute that we never hear, that guides our dancing, he hummed “Tha Xanarthis,” and she peeked out from behind an olive tree and said, of course I’m back, I had to come back, my darling Tristano, I thought youwere dead, I looked all over the islands for you, I wrote you a letter, then let the wind take it, then a firefly wandering in a field of reaped wheat told me you were here, Tristano, and so
newsreel in black and white, and the lack of color makes the scene less awful, all the other authorities are there on the stand for the occasion: the Minister of the Interior, the Defense Minister, a general weighed down by all the medals on his chest, the cardinal, maybe even two cardinals, the band with their plumes; next Sunday this solemn ceremony of homeland heroism will be shown in all the movie theaters in Italy, or at least in the big cities, before that gripping American movie where shesays that after all, tomorrow is another day, with that blood-red sunset in the background … and that
Incom Weekly
newsreel is historical, because younger generations have to know that what we have here is a national hero being decorated, yes, and he was really the one who performed this act of heroism, but that isn’t him, he’s like the unknown soldier, he represents all Italians, even we presidents and generals who weren’t in the Resistance, he represents us all, because the Italians were never fascists, and we recognize ourselves in him, the Italians always fought against fascism, always, they never dreamed of being fascists, not the Italians … I was the one dreaming, Tristano thinks, I wasn’t fighting against anyone, the fascists never existed, they were all in my imagination … the crooked president comes straight toward him accompanied by a high official who carries the war cross on a silver platter, they’re all banded together, Tristano; there’s no escape, Tristano thinks, now I’ll run away, that dawn back then I didn’t run away, I stayed behind that boulder and held on to my submachine gun, but now I’ll run away, it’s now or never, run, Tristano, run, or in a little while you’ll be a hero to these people, their equal, and it will all be over, irreversible … Writer, open the window, throw it wide open, I want to feel the cool of the evening, because the evening is dear to me when it comes, did they teach you that poem in school?, you must have had some nobody teacher who taught you that one, Tristano could have used some cool himself; instead he was sweating, the heat was unbearable, open my window, writer, let the cool night in, ah, night, it’s night that should be praised, far morethan evening, but it takes guts to praise the night, because the night brings dreams, and often nightmares, and it’s hard to face your nightmares, harder than facing the Nazis, that’s when you really see if you’re a hero; now, please let me be, I want to see if I can sleep.
I knew it was her, even when she was just a figure on the horizon, a bug, because I could make out those familiar, ample hips like an amphora vase where I’d laid my hands and my body; to the left, on the hill, were two Ionic columns, of course I knew they were really the towers from my window, but the painter who’d created this scene, who paints dreams, had transformed these towers into two Ionic columns, and little by little, getting closer, her legs also seemed like two columns, and a delicate vine climbed up to cover her pubis, and he wondered if she hadn’t become a tree, though the tree was moving, he was in his shroud, in the middle of this room that was flung wide open to the countryside, it was an idea of a room and inside this idea of a room was an olive grove that could only be the grove of Delphi, because the trunks were so gnarled and ancient, they could only be those of Delphi, the places they’d passed through in their life dancing dances with immemorial movements though not a trace remains, to the sound of a reed flute that we never hear, that guides our dancing, he hummed “Tha Xanarthis,” and she peeked out from behind an olive tree and said, of course I’m back, I had to come back, my darling Tristano, I thought youwere dead, I looked all over the islands for you, I wrote you a letter, then let the wind take it, then a firefly wandering in a field of reaped wheat told me you were here, Tristano, and so
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