Unaccustomed sea

1

The hull was thin and the wood was tricked out with shiny brass decorations.
She settled the snake-boat on the window ledge, opened the small pack with tiny wood oars and arranged them in the their room, in paddlers arms. The prow had a brass tip. The stern raising with a wood screen, as if it was the hood of a snake, provided the name to the craft. Eight pairs of rowers were sitting in the vessel, and behind them there was a place for two helmsmen. She looked at it proudly and thought it was awe-inspiring.
Ann’s actions were like a ritual of sorts, she attributed special meaning to each gesture. Now she owned a boat and she could go over seas, travelling and moving towards her desires. Fixing the oars was to assume she had the power to decide where to direct the boat, to decide where to sail.
Friends started to arrive for the dinner party. It was a very windy night, no possible to enjoy the garden. Next to the snake-boat there was a tray for glasses, holding almost twenty, of different shapes and colours. The floor was mostly covered with a cheap carpet, green with black geometrical patterns. The areas not covered by the big carpet were filled with small rugs that didn’t match each other. Some floor-sofa, mattress and pillows, were arranged on the edges of the room. The quality of the place was the remarkable piece of sky the big windows allowed to see. On the table in the corner there were bottles of red wine, mango juice and soda, mixed dried fruits, a bowl of salad, one of meatballs, and bread. As soon as Maya entered the room her attention was drawn to the boat that she admired. Ann was delighted by her friend’s sensitivity, although she didn't want to talk about it.
Ann had left her country nine months earlier to start a new job. Actually her way to deal with different jobs was connected with her willingness to travel and to know new countries and new people. To place herself in a new environment was a challenge and also a way to discover herself. That night her temporary-country was a kind of exile. She was able to feel at home in many places in the world, but now she was in unfriendly terrain. Should she sail off to somewhere else? Was the snake-boat a kind of invitation to move to an unaccustomed sea?
Ann caught Maya's eye and tried to communicate to her that the model-boat was a new and revered object, thus implicitly declaring a ban to talk with anyone about it, as if the keeping it secret could deepen a special link: she loved the man who had given her the ship.
A couple of friends arrived with a big cake and Ann started pouring everyone a drink, to warm up the party. Then she went to open the gate for some colleagues, and forgetting to put on shoes, she hurt her foot on a sharp stone.
Despite the pain, to have an excuse to get away from the crowd was a relief. Her mind was far away, distant like the man who had given her the snake-boat.
She sat on the terrace to clean the wound and to put on a plaster. The others caught up and she showed them the orchard and the vegetable garden, in combat with the dust and the branches carried on the wind. They took cover inside, and started to eat. Ann had just a glass of red wine. But, she couldn't wait any longer, her need to be alone couldn't be put off. She left the room, taking more wine with her, and reached her laptop upstairs, starting to type:
“The hull was thin and the wood was tricked out with shiny brass decorations.” She was writing a story since she had received the snake-boat, playing the words over in her mind.
“She settled the snake boat on the window ledge...”
But she felt she should be welcoming, and duty-bound, returned to her friends. She would go on writing right after the party.

2
The wind raises unnerving clouds of dust. I protect my mouth with the scarf. The houses on the hills are blurry and the light is ghastly. I walk as fast as I can. It's time to write but still there are duties in life. We choose our duties, but life also chooses for us. Is it real or fictional the distance between you and me? I feel blue. The sickness of missing your neck and your head in my hands casts a gloom over my afternoon. I'm shivering. I'm afraid to lose connection with my world. What is this rough wind making everything shudder and rock? Will I be able to lodge in words my beating heart? A week has passed since I was with you. Please, let me listen to your feeling.
Everyday I think about writing, acting words able to give event to an inner reality. Sweet man, are you listening me?
Inside your silence I decode messages, maybe just the ones I need.
I tighten the scarf and lower it to protect my eyes from the dust. The landscape seems to be preparing for an earthquake. I'm stirring and my hips are jiggling under my wide trousers. I don't need your messages to feel emotions.
I have a boat and I have to sail. Where is my sailor?

3
When she sat behind him on the yellow scooter she felt shy. Where should she put her hands? The closeness between two bodies has to be chosen instinct by instinct. Two lives full of memories can't be forced to share their nimbus. All her worries dissolved at once. She was in the right place; she couldn't be anywhere else. Her hands on the man's shoulders started to move on his neck, her fingers softly scratching his beloved head. Driving northwards she was pleased to have the seaside on her left: usually living on the west lakeshore, this new balance between water and land gave her a special novelty. Her hands found their proper place around the man's waist, and although it was very hot, she felt the need to embrace him, and she let her head lean on his shoulder, just for one precious instant.
They stopped for a short walk on a lonely beach. She perceived the presence of some kind of life, and just as they were leaving she discovered it was a turtle’s nesting site.
The road continued inland, climbing up and down hills covered by coconut palms. He stopped the scooter to show her a cashew tree, a tree she had never seen before. She was amazed to hear that her favourite nut was actually the seed of a strange yellow apple that resembled a pepper, and that it was encased by a shell with a toxic resin. So the most healthy and tasty nut wasn't a nut at all, and it was surrounded by poison too…
Carefully, using a tissue, she picked up a cashew seed and saved it in her bag.
When the road turned toward the sea, and climbed, and she saw the wild coast falling into the blue sea and red rust-coloured rocks, she felt a tingling sensation. She moved forward to grab the man's hips with her thighs, and she swallowed a magic sip of happiness.
They reached their destination, less exciting than the trip, and all the long way back her hands moved playfully under his t-shirt.
One encounter was yet to come: the scooter slowly passed an elephant walking in the street with an orange, painted trunk.
Later in the afternoon they were refreshed sitting on the sand, drifting out in the waves, and playing beautifully childish games in the sea.

4
In the middle of the night I open the door from my room onto the balcony. Breathing in fresh air I try to get asleep, but the sky excites me.
“Che fai tu luna, in ciel? Dimmi, che fai, silenziosa luna?
Sorgi la sera e vai, contemplando i deserti...”
What a sweet romantic poem! I used to repeatit to myself when I was a child. It was already telling me something about my destiny.
“...What are you doing moon in the sky? Tell me, what are you doing, silent moon? You rise in the evening and then you move on, contemplating deserts ...”
The power lines draw a three line staff in the sky, and the moon sits there like a big note, slowly descending into a planetary melody. I hear you, moon. You are singing. Gratefulness is the colour of my hearth.

5
A free day. A day to write. Ingredients: a miniature of a snake-boat, a woman living in unaccustomed terrain, a link to a man far away who gave her the snake-boat, a shining day together, a beating heart.
Nothing has happened until it has been described. She had to describe. She had to accomplish her need to deal with words, her need to use words as they were symbols to board on the ship sailing right that day.
After a cold shower she decided to wear the lightweight white dress she had worn one of the nights that she had spent with the man. She could still feel their lovely smell, his lovely hands strolling here and there, from her belly to any hollow parts of her body. An apple was on the table and she took a bite of it. The snake-boat had been moved onto the shelf behind the bed. She looked at it as she chewed the fruit. Sitting in front of her laptop Ann went back to thinking of her walk in the storm, and started to tap:
“The wind raises unnerving clouds of dust.”
The words were flowing, one after another. The dough was rising and gave her a pleasant sense of completeness. Her hand started to rub her skin gently over the thin cotton cloth. She made silence inside herself and she shuddered softly, feeling a mild electric current. She was breathing the freshness of being relaxed and the sense of freedom from bothersome clothes. She wrote and wrote, reviewing her memory under the feeling of that moment. As the words came out her sensitivity increased. Her nipples, remembering the sweet fingers and the sweet lips she knew, were looking for a touch. She skimed over her left one with the bitten apple. The nipple lifted. Her pelvis started to arch up, stirred by desire. The silence was an endless sea, with calm and continuous waves. Now she was sailing on a bright route.