THE BAY OF BOSTON

So did the leaves tremble
at the breath of
a sudden chill,
in the midst of
colorful hopes already
owned by others,
as the same road awaits.

Montreal cold and gray
with all those shops,
incongruous
with spices and pungent smells
deceived us of where
we really were.

Then I left you in such moldy flats
to spend a never ending winter,
lone at your empty banquet.

The sightseeing along
the highway
staged a melancholic show:
distant reds, yellows,
and agonizing greens
red, burgundy, into brown again.
A see-through of skeletons
the stretched trees stood
slowly sinking into apparent death.

I now stand looking at the dense black water
of the ocean
washing needles ashore
while the unrelenting joy
of a clear day
stands behind the newly built 
outstanding condos promenade. 

THAT VIRGINIA by Amalray

Under cascades of birds

chirping colorful swarms

I walk on the same clean roads

you just walked yesterday.

A toy stuck in its mechanism

I religiously search

Over and over, I vacuum

all areas of town, it's the same sun 

that strikes me in late mornings

along the barren roofs’ skyline

strawberry, lavender and after mint tints.

A pale yellow pierces me deep in my heart

was it your tank top

or your beautiful arms.

I stroll down Virginia ave

on sunny mornings alone,

delinquent I burst blindfolded by light

and slide down the hill

as I do many times

others' working days in leisure I enjoy.

I am out on my own with no one to play

I turn left on Monroe

there are no signs of life

just quiet cars cruise by the lifeless row

of soft pastels townhouses’ emaciated tones.

I turn my eyes uphill to the traffic that speeds

and see butterflies drawn to fire that kills

beauty and poison

of decadent flowers

that grow wild on Ponce to breathe air that’s sour .

There is a tranquil simplicity

here hiding our crimes

covering tragedies of everyday life.

It’s hope or monotony which make us all numb

to live in a dream’s dissonance and charm.

Could it be the architecture, the linear design

the empty stores’ windows, the derelict beings?

This walk is a sample of our Southern lives

covered by dust and irreparable lies.

VAN GOGH

Many times things lay under our eyes, inert, unnoticed. Today I saw a picture of a well known painting by Vincent Van Gogh, called “The Bedroom” completed about two years before his tragic death. In the synopsis on the painting it’s mentioned that in a letter to his brother Theo, Van Gogh considered this piece to be his best one at that time. According to the record some of the original color of the walls and doors, initially purple, due to discoloration has become the light blue we see today. This made me think of Michelangelo’s frescoes of the Sistine Chapel before the restoration, how time added a special touch to the masterpiece. 

There are certainly many more interesting facts related to this work. Here I will only take to consideration those inherent to the personal impact and intimate connection that drew me to it. Therefore I won’t go deep into the fore standing details and historical circumstances in which Van Gogh gave birth to this particular work, obviously well documented. What I am interested in is the transcendent light emanating throughout the space. It might be plausible my thoughts will coincide with the actual meaning and form related to it, but I will leave it to chance.

The moment I saw “The bedroom” it felt familiar. The striking light, crystal clear and all pervading, made it sort of a universal prototype, essential and primordial, it let on an element present in all things, a subtle thread binding them all together. It reminded me of the mornings at my parents house, waking up late in the reinvigorating brilliance of the sunshine. It gave me the same feelings of old Italian movies, the literary works of Pierpaolo Pasolini or T.S. Eliot’s Waste land just to cite a few examples; where the transient past is captured into the same eternal glare. A blinding light ubiquitous and permeating. A morning light that washes away impurities. It appears as if the artist had cleaned and neaten the room in a desperate ritual. The furnitures and objects are different elements with iridescent affinity, dynamically alive. We see a welcoming environment meticulously arranged, a joyous tragic day celebrating rebirth. Is it Sunday? A sunny ordinary day or overcast indeed? Is the light coming from within the room, from its inner space, the walls or the objects? There is no need to open that window at the far end, to know what’s behind it, it could be anything or any place. There is such energy in this work that it makes it almost unbearable to look at, terrifying. The sharp and clear vision is overwhelming. It shows the process of life, a continuous and constant act of rebuilding over ruins. It is human tragedy endlessly repeating where time stands as bright as an never ending dream, leaving us in anguish. We are aware that Van Gogh expressed his mystical experiences with the clarity and awareness that led him to madness. Madness, superficially condemned and exiled because incompatible with the intellect of common mortals, who fail to grasp its essence and the driving force behind it. This is “The Bedroom”, a place of no return. It’s the joy and the curse that haunts humanity. It’s my life but also yours.

TORINO

TORINO

 

by Albino Mattioli

 

The heavy iron door shut behind me. I felt the key turning and the deadbolts sliding into the sockets in my chest. My wrist hurt. Under the bandage the tight stitches were stretching my skin. I walked slowly through the narrow corridor, the rooms were all on the left with no doors. The yellowish walls were bare and dirty, stained mattresses were folded on the vacant beds. All windows had bars. I saw a desolate patient seating by the barred window. The sergeant in charge of the psychiatric ward, looked really off, he wore a white coat and had an Indian cap from Manali on his head. He pointed towards the narrow and gloomy corridor with glittering eyes and told me, with a slight grin "you can take any bed you want" as he hastened back to his post near the entrance to finish his cigarette.

Still drowsy from the medication they had given me in Alessandria, I dragged myself around, peered in the empty rooms without fully making a sense of where I was. Weakened by the loss of blood, I ended up crushing on one of those stinky mattresses, oblivious of the smell and my surroundings. I looked outside through the bars. It was a damp morning. I thought about my mother’s ingenuous joy at the train station a week earlier, happy to see me off to the military service. Here I was at the psychiatric ward waiting for my dismissal, a slit wrist and under medication.

The sergeant in Savona at the military camp infirmary had told me he would bring flowers to my grave rather than sending me home. I couldn’t eat. Then few days later, seeing my emaciated condition, he relented and had me transferred to the Alessandria Military Hospital for treatment. When the ambulance dropped me off in the morning, it was assembly time and all the patients, mainly young boys from the South who were also there hoping to be sent home for convalescence, had all gathered in the main hall on the first floor. The Alessandria Military Hospital was managed like a prison and even though gloomy and decadent, the architecture preserved its aesthetic value and charm. Originally a church, the Chiesa di San Francesco with adjacent convent, it was built during the late 1200 AD and later transformed into a hospital. At the assembly the colonel strongly repeated with a resonant voice “...from Alessandria everybody gets cured and is sent back to the battalion!”. Those words made my heart shrink. The idea to return back to Savona to be assigned later to some remote area on the north and waist one year of my life in such depressing environment made me more sick. The following days I aimlessly wandered around the vaulted pavilions and ancient chambers. Everybody looked desperate and lost. All the eyes I saw were downcast, void, depressed. Some of the boys were crying. I finally had a break down, I couldn’t take it anymore, it all became unbearable. One night I couldn’t sleep, I looked at the high concave ceiling for hours, then as the first morning light appeared everybody started to get up, pale as a shroud, I went to ask for a razor. Someone kindly handed me a plastic disposable one. I entered the crowded bathrooms, everybody was going in and out. The noise of water running and the undistinguished voices bounced loudly against the vault above. I felt the dampness in my joints, there was a mixed smell of urine and disinfectant. I went in one of the toilettes, tore the razor and extracted the tiny blade. I held my breath, closed my eyes, raised my right hand and let it drop sliding the thin blade through my left wrist. I just walked out of the bathrooms in the crowded hall standing with my arms down, a stream of blood dripping on to the floor. Many petrified eyes were staring at me, I heard a lot of commotion, then officials arrived, as I collapsed on the floor, they took me to the infirmary were, in front of the shocked and upset eyes of the colonel, I was given few stitches and afterward sent urgently to Torino were I was now interned.

The loud sound of the deadbolts echoed in the room again. As the iron door opened and closed I heard there was someone else at the entrance. The voice of the officer calling my name resounded in the corridor. I got up and from the threshold I could see him talking to a doctor. The doctor looked at me and shouted “Why is he here? He should be in the general medicine ward!”. He was holding my medical report. He got on the phone, then he hanged up and gestured me to follow him. The heavy iron door unlocked again and opened with a screech. I followed the doctor through the gardens, we passed the church, I was finally breathing some fresh air. The hospital was a vast complex. The main driveway was lined with trees, a big park stood amid the rows of long buildings connected one another by glass galleries. When we entered, our steps resounded as we went up the staircases, through the long vacant corridors and the luminous galleries from where the outside world, veiled by the glass, appeared vague, blurred and devoid of life. The pavilion I was assigned to, was on the second floor of the General Medicine Ward, spacious with tall ceilings and arched windows. There were quiet nuns dressed in white, moving slowly around the beds while attending to the patients.

The doctor called for the head nun and after wishing me good luck he left me in her care. My bed had clean sheets and was neat. For dinner they brought a plate of steamed spinaches, fresh mozzarella and bread. There were four kids next to me, also waiting to be sent home, with whom I instantly became friend. They were from all different parts of Italy. Two of them, every night, after the unsuspecting nuns retired to their rooms, would disappear behind the thick curtains, crawl down from the window, jump over the wall and vanish in the dark. They would come back later on with pizza, beer, cigarettes and magazines.

One week passed and due to the gravity of my case, I was the first one to be dismissed and to be sent home. When I broke the news to the group, there were cheers of joy and unrestrained happiness as if all of us were leaving together. They all hugged me and congratulated me, some of us even shed few tears; we all exchanged addresses and promised to keep in touch, although it never happened.

The hospital sent me home with one month of recovery leave, then I would have to go to a local military hospital near Rome, with medical certification in hand from a local psychiatric center, to regularly assess my conditions. I was free and I could finally taste again Rome's bright days.