Vito Pandolfi
Gli ultimi

An unusual Friulian priest, David Maria Turoldo, and a Tuscan Marxist intellectual, Vito Pandolfi, mix them together, add a sprinkle of Pinocchio, plenty of wine, and lots and lots of polenta, shake it all well, and you'll have a masterpiece.

I'm not here to tell you lies, you read that correctly, let me spell it out for you, MA-STER-PIECE.

It was meant to be the first part of a trilogy, but the story ended there, and we are satisfied nonetheless with the material we are given; it would be a disservice to the film to tell its plot, which, very simply, would be the initial autobiography of the uncomfortable priest, so let’s bypass that. The life story described, set in the poor rural Friuli of the 1930s, at the dawn of a barely glimpsed fascism, presented the only alternative of dying of hunger or working in the mines, in Belgium, Tertium non datur.

Despite everything, it is preferred to stay, with dignity and without resignation, and it will still be the best choice; one chooses to continue working the master's scant land, gleaning corn, cutting grass for the three sheep, cleaning the channels, bartering polenta for a few chestnuts, pretending that the second slice of polenta is instead the cheese that will come, maybe, tomorrow at the table.

And then the personal problems of an ante litteram bullying, which has always existed after all, the difficult relationships with a grumpy and strict father, of few words, the scarecrows with which he’s terribly and continuously associated, even by his father, in short, a dry, harsh Bildungsroman, not at all compassionate, that could have produced further results if it hadn't been that the film was boycotted by Friuli itself. The poverty displayed was too blatant and so close to an incoming economic Boom that would have projected us forward without recognizing that, on the contrary, we were going backward, and even the church authorities, always them!, did not look favorably upon this partnership between a troublesome friar and a secular Marxist intellectual, and so the film was excluded from the distribution circuit controlled by them and soon forgotten by all.

Entirely shot in Codermo, Udine, by the local inhabitants, it might well remind one of certain passages of Padre padrone or L'albero degli zoccoli but stands out for its complete dryness and austerity, with a cold, essential, black and white, harsh and lean, in keeping with certain flat, desolate, and deserted landscapes buffeted by a Bora that reigns supreme; retrieved at the beginning of the century and recently restored, the film deserves to be seen if for nothing else than the extraordinary performance, but all are exceedingly good and fitting, of Adelfo Galli, the child protagonist, today an acclaimed sculptor, from Nomadelfia.

Comparing the viewing of this film to a necessary bath of humility is not out of place, a bath as mighty and restorative, in which the priority of certain now-forgotten values is reset and realigned once and for all to the starting point, I recommend it.

I enclose at the bottom the touching tale by David Maria Turoldo, which inspired the film, "Io non ero un fanciullo," a brief writing by Giuseppe Ungaretti, and a review by Pier Paolo Pasolini (that alone would have sufficed).

Mandi!
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Giuseppe Ungaretti in 1962:

"Perhaps it is the stupendous solitude of Friuli, where I lived during the first two years of the First World War, alternating with the Carso; perhaps it is the incredibly spontaneous and true artistry of the child; perhaps it is the simple and absolute way of showing the terrible symbols of death and hunger; I know it is an unforgettable film, infinitely more beautiful than the few I've admired this year, it is a film uniquely dictated by pure and high poetry"

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Pier Paolo Pasolini in 1962:

"Gli ultimi: «Absolute aesthetic severity»
by Pier Paolo Pasolini
in “Ultime notizie Globe”, III, March 22, 1963
in Saggi sulla letterature e sull’arte, II, Meridians Mondadori, Milan 1999


Nostalgia, as a sin, and therefore dominated by a severe, almost bleak sense of renunciation, is the ideology of this film. It is consistent from beginning to end, and thus ends up presenting itself as a stylistic system, closed and without any appeasement or compromise.
There is no escape from the monotony of nostalgia, nor from the dullness of morality. Gli ultimi is a monotonous and gray film, but loaded with an exasperated consistency with its own stylistic premise, and therefore deeply poetic. There is not a single shot filmed in sunlight: the moon always that of winter, with high, compact clouds, which, in their way, are as absolute as the clear sky. And the village is always immobile, in purest black and white, and the countryside bare, drawn with an iron point. The vision of things is always frontal, and, at the same time, restricted, as if even the gaze that an eye might finally cast freely upon the world was dominated by the moral obligation to smallness and renunciation. It is evidently Father Turoldo’s religious sentiment that imposes this word and says: «If there must be nostalgia for my country and my childhood, it should not embellish them: it should instead reduce them to the extreme, and its expansion should occur only in depth». Vito Pandolfi has executed this almost neurotic religious obligation with absolute aesthetic severity. And all the characters thus tend to assimilate it: thin, exhausted, gray, sickly, anonymous, sustained only by a puff of almost sectarian spirituality. Gradually, the suite of life in the small foothill village, with its gray stone houses and its white roads, in the blinding light of the snowy air, becomes iteration, litany: the series of episodes becomes obsessive, and the meanings of the poor human story transcend to a symbolism poorer in ornament the richer in an almost physical pain."

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I Was Not a Child

David Maria Turoldo

It was a sad and at the same time inevitable conviction: that it was alive. Alive like me. Not that I knew what « alive » meant. Perhaps, in words, I couldn't string it together even today. I didn't even know the meaning of « like me ». Later, I spoke to it, gesticulated like it, asked it questions; for the first years from afar, of course. Now I shouted at full voice, and now instead timidly, afraid it would mimic me. Then I would syllable the answers myself, firmly convinced it was it who responded... Instead, it was me, myself. Thinking about it still veils my sight today and rusts my voice. What a risk I went through!

Not all the blame was mine; it was also those companions. Those companions! ... It was my brothers too, at least Lino, two years older than me: we often quarreled, and even they sometimes called me by that name. Perhaps my mother was also unwittingly to blame, dressing me in the house’s latest rags; with a straw hat in summer, which looked like a trash can's bottom, nibbled by mice; and an old alpine hat in winter, or an army cap, I don't know whether Italian or Austrian: leftovers and debris from invasions that certainly came to bring civilization to that poor land of Friuli, trampled by all in every war. A cap that companions (always the companions!) often yanked off my wedge head—the wedge for splitting logs to crack hard stumps—and hung on a tree, and then a game, in warlike target shooting. I had to stand there, aside, watching, maybe crying, but with no right to protest. Later, when all left, damnably satisfied, I had to pick it up, beat off the dust quietly, and leave...

Then this: that I didn't have any rights, none, has stuck with me even today like a convict's uniform; and not only unconsciously. It’s another bitter legacy of my childhood, for which I feel uncomfortable among people. Although now violent, overbearing in my turn, yet even today, often, I find myself thinking I have no rights, none at all, for anything. So, after throwing the stone, I walk ashamed steps through the streets. And after accepting an invitation, after lunch, after any gift, I endlessly ask to be excused, forgiven, tolerated... This way, I reach the shame of shame. Because now I have both roles in fortune: that of hitting the target right with stones—which I learned from that flock that dispersed cawing after leaving me there, near the ditch, weeping desolately over my colander cap—and, together, this dark and invincible awareness of having no reasons. And I think: here, I am still that child mocked by all and without any right to be respected. Sometimes I am tempted to say to God: why must I feel so bad in the world? —But that is a big question, perhaps without answers.

So, I had to let it go, otherwise, there would be brawls and bloody bites. It was always me and that cap that I would never forget at fault. Sometimes it was also the jacket that left some tear in the sleeve or shoulder. It looked like a flag at half-mast. Dear my jacket, I still see it, feel it weighing upon me like a cardboard armor. And then the satchel... These details of the stone-throwing, of aiming at targets, are the bitter wine of my memory. They created and fueled and magnified, to the gravest nightmare, a despairing conviction in me; a conviction I couldn't reveal to anyone in those years, and which now constitutes the fabric of these pages. Even now, as I narrate and vent, I can't judge myself healed, precisely freed from that nightmare.

When these gloomy fantasies started to take root in me, I can't determine precisely. They certainly lasted until the age of twelve or thirteen, at least. Very early on, I thought I wasn't like the others, even before elementary school. Then, progressively, I was more and more persuaded that I was something else, another and very poor thing. Everything conspired to force me to think so...

So, they also called me « polentone ». I grew tall, like a stick, perhaps taller or on par with the others. In the village, everyone is tall and robust. Conscription day, I remember, although I marked down one and eighty-six, I was an average height compared to the « comrades ». They ate well, while I had polenta, and polenta, and more polenta. That created another inferiority complex. How angry I got! ... I was also a redhead, the last child of the village’s last house, not even six or seven, and my siblings had already emigrated, and there was no one to defend me. My sister Maria worked in Novara at twelve. (Later in school, I more easily remembered Curtatone and Novara because of my sister, and not of Garibaldi, surely.) Anselmo went to Paris illegally at sixteen. I thought: Anselmo at least eats bread! At sixteen, I too would eat bread, and I would no longer be called « polentone ». But ten years awaited me!

However, this is not the saddest point of the story. I did enjoy polenta: it was fragrant and warm, a beloved creature. When with milk, – when there was some! – or with cheese, – yet again, when there was some! – it tasted like honey. Try eating polenta and milk, boiled together; or cheese covered with warm polenta, rounded in the hands; and the cheese sweating inside, from heat! I’d wager no rich man had ever eaten his pastries with such hunger and relish as I bit those slices of gold. But, as I said, this isn’t the saddest point.

Being burdened with nicknames increasingly isolated me; it seemed each was a post in the fence of my solitude; or I felt they weighed on my whole body like the faded and worn patches my mother, at night, sewed over the pants or jacket holes. It resembled a Mongol vagrant’s uniform. Those first garments of mine are unforgettable!

I had already started school by then. Though thus grown, red-haired, and with hands stretching half a meter out of the sleeves, and a conical, or rather half-conical, head, (it truly seemed missing a portion of the head), perched on a broomstick-like neck; I remember: at nearly six years old and already a student I was still dressed in a girl’s outfit. That soul of my mother bore no blame: she had nine, and I was the last one left. For the last, everything worked, used and discarded by the grown-ups. My father cared not for appearances. He was practical and independent. He wanted the children like him, paying no mind to others. He had my hair cut with scissors. My head must have looked like Jacob’s ladder; the companions instead chanted after me: « bell tower ladder, bell tower ladder ». They chanted it rhythmically and insistently for entire days until my hair grew back. My father and mother, I repeat, were not to blame. Our house lacked even cents for salt. (By the way: those years from '25 to '26, when salt began rising, what a disaster in our house! But this doesn’t pertain either).

Thus, dressed as a girl, excessively tall and long-headed, shorn that way, with hands I shan’t describe; and my feet! A sight to behold, my feet in those years! Never a pair of shoes; merely clogs in winter. My feet in those years free-sailed the plain like rafts on the sea. If you can, consider what I might have resembled. Never mind resemblance! Instead, I was convinced to be what perhaps you think and as the companions called me. A name I still dread to repeat. Indeed, it is the nightmare that plagued my early childhood. My childhood, so tested and stingy! That was the name echoed by the entire village, and I bore it about, a true baptism of bitterness.

II

One day was more bitter than any other. I shall never forget it. I was out grazing, as usual. Back then, being small, I had only our two sheep and a lamb, offspring of the younger, called « Mora », herself daughter of « Stella », the dearest sheep I had. Yet Mora and her child weren't as good as the mother. If I set Stella to graze on one bank of the ditch, there was no danger she’d venture to eat on the other, forbidden one. Owner of which was a mustached and burly farmer. But she grazed only the demesne grass. Yet her daughter and lamb grandchild now tended to emancipate themselves. Now, years later, I surprise myself saying: what a difference in those three sheep generations!

We owned no land. In the village countryside, there wasn't a meter for pastures. Everyone exploited the arable to the centimeter. Kilometers of barley or oats or rye were needed to reach a sufficient harvest, even for a normal family. One always had to keep sheep tethered. Now, for surety, my father took me along. He went off with wheelbarrow and scythe along village roads to clear dust-clad banks, from village to village. And much hay was needed to arrive, measuring it arm-in-arm through the long winter, at feeding « Rosa » we kept in the barn: the sole cow meant to suffice for all eleven mouths. Bent over the scythe, he couldn’t always keep an eye on me. So, I left the sheep alone or tied to some acacia and went; alone, to play by the Ledra, an almost always icy channel, from melted snow in Carnia mountains; a whitish water, and sometimes yellowish due to storms lowering their belly on the plain and then shattering against the mountains. Back then, for fun, I picked through the gravel, on fine days, for the smoothest tiles, and launched them against the current to skip, like swallows, cresting the water. It was a joy that made me forget sheep and father and my condition. It was one such day. I stood by the canal with a selection of stones. I tossed one after the other, shouting at each bounce, and said: this one is better, that one isn’t worth it, this other is an arrow... Then it happened: from the fields, behind the hedge, fresh with French hay and swaying green wheat, I suddenly heard shouting, cursing, and running. The owner had lunged after Mora and her child, and it started baaing in fright. He was a fierce man, a scarecrow for all kids. He shouted and wildly brandished the trident, and cursed. Then he stumbled and fell. I felt like stone in that sudden silence. My father mowed unaware, about half a kilometer away. Naturally, the sheep ran toward him, surer of better defense. The greedy man, rose on fields, was now in front of my father. I, far behind, don't know what offense spewed forth from that mouth. At least may he have taken me, that giant! His face boiled with wine. What did my father have to do with it? From afar, I saw him whiten. He said not a word. The scythe had halted like a clock pendulum. Now I know of first instinct he’d wanted to hurl himself on that St. Christopher. My God, with scythe in hand! Yet my father was just.

Calmed and secured sheep to a tree, and after the hulking brute left, he came seeking me. I’d already flown to hide in a field of grain. I can't recall my father mad ever, and perhaps that was the first time, or at least the first I remember: as if today. I recall the air’s color, the tragedy’s hour; I still bear on my heart the tone of his voice, somewhat clipped from offense. That brute tall and strong died many years ago; I was yet a child. And it was, pardon me, a real relief for me; perhaps even for my father, although my father, sincerely Christian, bore no grudge for anyone. But I also know of other matters of that damned one. I know, for instance, he had even tried laying hands on my father over some corncobs. With us, « stuff » has always been more important than God, blood, and friendship. Though we all at least used to attend sacraments and also sing in the evening servicio on Sundays.

So, I felt a fledgling amid the grain, between two fears: that the brute would find me first, and then my father would discover me. Both equally horrendous fears, of different hue, but sharply ringing in my ears. I stayed curled and unmoving in a furrow as though an abandoned log, silent as a lizard. Only blood beat with force beneath the temples: it felt like hitting the earth with blood. When I no longer heard my father's voice yet felt his steps near my shrouded self (I was not a child!), already about to discover me. I then lay face to ground, not to see his gaze. Perhaps ten steps, perhaps eight, perhaps five, and then... I remember a mortal, infinite silence over the countryside. I had even ceased to breathe. Had he not finally reached me, perhaps I'd have remained stifled. Fortunately, he did reach me. So, the presence was atop me as if climbing with feet upon my back. A mountain boulder seemed. The slender back like a reed appeared splitting. Instead, barely bent, he had seized my waist with one hand, saying: « I've found you, eh ». Perhaps that hero, friend to all children, never felt such fear in his great adventures, not even amidst a shark’s teeth. My father, pale, bore cold fore-sweat and some dry hay blades. His lips were dry and drawn like blades. He said only: come! A useless word, he himself carried me like a rag in rags. Fortunately, I started breathing again. Already some minutes had passed, yet no blows. Perhaps a good sign...

Indeed, I hadn’t seen my father rarely hit us. I myself received not more than a slap from his immense and hard hands. Understandably, I was the last of the great brood. Many weaknesses exist for the last one. Yet that day, he might have forgotten I was the last; and then I began to age: I was grown, too grown. But that wretched fraud's offense was truly grave. I learned later, many years later, from my father himself, when he wasn’t just my father but my friend, and he foremost among my friends. An offense I shall not repeat. See, it was an affront to all poor's misery, the way the poor beget children. Thus, it also wounded my mother, saintly creature. For my father, it was like injuring the Madonna.

So. Things proceeded well, it seemed. Already he dragged me meters in silence. I only heard some clicks in the palate and muttering among teeth. I followed each move like a lamb the wolf’s prowling. When he placed me amid the field, where he was hoisted and waved in a slight wind: and moved with rag and straw clatters as we approached. Up close, it bore a horrible face, both laughing and crying. It was pupil-less, perhaps the owl ate them at night. From the front arose some rooster feather, like an uncrowned Native American. An arm hung, weary, from the wood as though broken. It turned slowly, perhaps under desperation's weight. I had never found myself so under it; never have I felt dying like that day hanging like refuse basket from my father’s talon.

The fact for all of you may seem ridiculous or impossible. Yet it was so. All fellow companions attached his name to me for the countryside and neighbors. Beautiful Christian land mine: ruin a child with that moniker. Hence I never neared him, both in rebellion and to credit that nothing common was shared between us. I circled around like frightened birds. Try persecuting a creature since three or four years old, saying: you are a quadruped, you are a quadruped, quadruped! —then deny, if you manage, that in end they don’t feel a true quadruped, for long and perhaps lifetime. Let fathers shout it to a son one day, in a situation akin to mine that day, and see what fate befalls that wretch. It could be they start crawling precisely on all fours. Truly the matter needs diligent following. From my father’s mouth, I never imagined such a nickname for the youngest born.

So he too thought so, like the entire village? Then was it true I was not a child, a creature like all others? I believed my father. With such force and conviction that sorrowful name was whispered on my face, that I started crying, despairingly. My father, in full answer, lifting me high as a hanged man, « see – he said – this pole: thus, next time you'll hang, understand? ». Meanwhile, he pressed me against himself, high on the grain. Then felt the blow of mine against his cheek and screamed as if to die. I curled up, suspended in convulsion and terror. I cried tearless. From the eyes, no droplet emerged. Felt within, remember well, the soul flying from me, like magician’s fire from mouth. Lost now, no doubt left. They were right to call me that. I was like him! This event killed me. I was slain by my father, with that name...

Above lay only the empty, pale sky of early summer. Long I continued to feel the contact of that loathsome body. With gesture and that name inflicted upon my face equal to a sword, my father finally suspended me on a precipice. Felt blood loss, my little reason a dim candle extinguished. Also, sight faltered, staring at things. The earth from that position seemed distant, unreachable. Now certain: exists child’s pain, adults will never express or evaluate. That was one of my most secluded bitternesses. « Marum » as said in Friuli. I was still lost between sky and earth; sobbing inhuman cries, finally gazed at my father like a wounded stag. Then felt already skewered, abandoned to day and night's wind; felt that black smudge, that heap of tatters at target for all rock throws; and fled by birds; and left to hang even in winter above desolate fields. Swayed with my rags, with my alpine cap, with my spinning, spinning head...

This way the ghost invaded instantly, penetrated all fibers, besieged, seized from within, killing me at root when weakest sense of self was to sprout. A true enemy invasion occupying years. Thus made flesh in me the most sorrowful nightmare. I dreamed of him at night, cursed and invoked him alike, for protection from people’s cruelty. I fled and sought him; eventually amidst those tatters, I accustomed to my persecuted garb. « Hence – said at every boy scuffle – I’m not a child... »

III

It was over for me. I fell ill. Continued weak, increasingly tall and with blood reaching not even extremities. My fingers were wooden, especially in winter. Just like his cold fingers. What cod liver oil my mother gave me! Still I went grazing, in early years, always with my father. But the transformation was complete. The village continued calling me by that name I’d since accepted as natural. I wasn’t a child. Maybe never had been. It's a difficult concept to describe. Less and less fear did the scarecrow inspire. Became one with him: he resided within. I was him, or at least among many swaying in the crops. Now understood why other boys fled me, threw rocks, no one liked me for years; or so it seemed.

One stood tall in first fields behind village chapel, between school and our small plot, like a garden. My father often went there, kept it pristine. I spent daylong with him. And « That », in time, became dearest friend. At first, seemed nothing alike me. The ears, I told myself, aren’t mine; such large ears—not like Anastasio’s, my cousin now lost in Russian steppes. The nose and eyes are Gelindo's. But the head was mine, futile seeking other's resemblances, mine entirely, always somewhat dangling on these stilt-like legs. Forever without speed, without articulation. A wooden body, moved sluggishly, rustily squeaking hinges. Couldn’t run, couldn’t walk. When boys played « flag », neither team wanted me running, for I caused losses; thus discarded, named each time with thus nickname. School was worse ever. Repeated various classes. The teacher made all efforts to extract some use. Boys then passed from mouth to mouth, softly, that damned nickname, and laughed. Teacher when aware, scolded, but in semblance of « not very convinced ». « See, even she believes », told myself, failing answers in history. And left so. She instead so gently chided because she was more mother than teacher.

Resigned to my role, went to fields willingly. Gave up even solitary games; no longer threw a stone at him, made no faces. Prayed within me a bird, at least a thrush, a lark, or magpie, would alight atop his ever-open arms. His hands drooped infinitely weary. I neared and took them always with equaled curiosity and surprise; at times left them fall like dead. Felt within a straw’s rustle, nearly moan amid high field silence. Then, especially at evening, felt my skin wrinkle. Touched myself similarly, checking if beneath my rags, that repressed rustling emerged. No doubt: a shared moan poured on fields by evening. Wore verdigris dress. Mouth and eyelids brick-colored wounds; rust streamed from hat’s brim and from waist, down to feet, where wire tied those junkman remnants. Exactly like my clothes, now bound by string, now fibers stripped from some town electrical wiring thing (surely not from my house, where for many years had only an old lamp). Felt an indescribable pity. None demeaned look spare; not a cicada sang upon his hat: at least one summer-afternoon, when thus lonesome. Or at least one shoulder. No maiden bore a posy of wild flowers. Continued hanging from that wood, immense and heavy. Seemed weight of despair itself. Perhaps never slept. Ruminating now, seemed body of boredom. Often a light, yet often fierce wind (our plain vast and open like steppe to sea bore, storms cascade from mountains) flitted about him or raged against, making him screech with hunted creature timbre, especially at night. Fatal it was I felt fear. Melded with mattress noise, made of corn-chaffs; it merged with old shutters clattering, cardboard served window panes at home. It seemed a soul in penance descending my heart from gnawed ceiling rafters, worn by woodworms. Nighttimes, especially wintry, filled with mysterious din and phantoms; and abrupt silences tearing breath. I curled to bed-scorner beneath worn gunny covers; stayed without heart’s throb, unto suffocation. Dreamed it eyes-open. Saw it stride streets, ascend stairs slowly; now spied it within room. Felt against cheek, like that father’s day, his rough face’s touch. It collapsed over, let hand drop, with thud, as if wooden paw hit floor. Instead was blood beating bedward, pounding beneath temples. Awakened then, called my mother. She always arrived with her flickering wick, torn and unequal to darkness: a flame startled, threatened by shadow forest thickening to walls, corners, and behind door. In pale, wavering light room resembled fabulous battlefield. My face must’ve appeared tree ravaged under storm; probably seemed castaway she somehow still saved. Cold sweat and endless, broken cry prevented word. Only much later gale ceased, relative peace returned, healed soundlessly emerged, as finally she carried me to her bed; placed me in that divine child space, that vale of warmth and mysterious joy and paradisiacal security and abandonment (after so long!) to sweetest and most childish dreams; that space, say, traversing youngster imagination like a delightful river between two saintly body banks, in great bed. Then felt unassailable trench. No ghost scared. Resumed initiative, boldly called every shadow by name. Morning wrenched from that sunny warbase, from that valley of fabulous joy, its unique border older brother's envy. Thus my mother patiently healed me of that long, terrible malaise known solely to me yet never shared with any.

But certainly not always so. Those were rare, singular nights; and then mornings, upon waking, in which none in world might match my fortune. Instead, mostly in those long winters, I called not my mother. Fearful she’d discover my awful secret. Didn’t want to. Perhaps shame, perhaps modesty. Since particularly also my father unwittingly screamed in my face that name. And remained curled beneath covers awaiting wind’s ceasing to bring his voice and groan entire home and plain. Then seemed to awake: actually neither wake nor sleep. Perhaps peculiar consciousness state, then unknowable to me. Were two phases of my ailed self: that resigned to diurnal role as his friend and equal, and that unquenched and nocturnal, seeking escape magical-circle of his presence. Saw him projected ahead, swaying, in dark, barren room gloom: more tawdry attic than room. Needed spring returning to feel again relatively calm. Then ancient ache resumed and a, perhaps amplified trust.

Returned to fields. Gathered many stones, deposited at his gallows base; and with built castles, trenches, bridges over imagined rivers. Under his shadow, while grain grew, sat long and spoke to him. Told him all my things; spoke loudly, gratified none could hear me. None ever cared about him. Swallows returned, vineyards bloomed, crops ripened, sheep birthed: yet for him were only wind and sun and rain; and indifferent stars above his head. Sometimes saw him against the moon, low on plain: seemed a being dressed half black and half silver. Then his tatters too, turned lace and rare embroidery. Managed to even dream a sometimes smiling face. Was truce between my day and night warring within. Dream-smelt his wind and sun scent, and ripe hay. Seemed freely soaring space, finally ceased lamenting none from village marked any concern for me. Also, my body bore wind and sun scent, strong and accustomed to all weather. Even within my misery's fringes played sun and wind. Else, albeit slowly, even village wearied of calling by that name. Companions, envious and malformed (envious of what? and malformed why? another enigma unresolved), fewer now. Already went with others to free pastures and with much flock...

IV

By now, for better or worse, I aged. Things happened I couldn't narrate even today. Who could say how a flower arises, how a stalk matures, how a living being, chick or lark, emerges from the egg? None can state how an idea arises, where it comes from and where it leads: the choice of a peculiar profession; what becomes of a child's life, what direction, arise and arch upon world of this our adventure. I can say nothing specific on what then happened.

Schooling, for better or worse, concluded; I must decide. Thankfully our condition left no escape. One had to choose. My father was relentless. In ‘twenty-eight, ‘twenty-nine, ‘thirty famine tyrannized our house. Returning from school or fields, I describe not the mute envy I felt for companions, who immediately pulled white bread sandwiches, cheese, and sausage from their satchels or shepherd sacks. The fragrance stung my nostrils like oats’ scent to horses, like pollen for spring bees. I stared drunkenly: and saliva pooled on lips’ edge, then ever-ajar with wonder. Must have seemed a perfect idiot, both enchanted and lost. I then dared ask companions, now one then another of gentler ones, a morsel, merely to taste its flavor. Some gave crumbly bits. I held pieces, in mouth; let dissolve slowly like sweets, swallowed as late as possible. Truly say sweetness of bread, grape grains, fig, offered mercifully by some kind soul. Know water’s flavor, chestnut’s goodness, terrestrial flavor of certain roots gathered by my mother from fields. And radish’s spiciness, barley’s sweet tone...

In those years, wandered fields gleaning after reapers. Returned by evening with small bundle of grain, arranged as a wreath like symbols over tabernacles' doors. That was all our wheat. About twenty loaves each summer. Then nothing until new harvest. Later, in autumn, I scavenged some stray corn cob, always post-harvest. These my father bartered with chestnut men descending from Carnia, also famine driven to plains: an equal corn measure for matching chestnut measure, stored for all saints and dead's night. He must personally cook them, in old and black holed pan. Flames danced between chestnut, always stirred by father's steady rhythm. A solemn rite. We all gather 'round the hearth, as aroma pervades house; restless for father’s patience to finally end; and declare, as at time right he usually did: see, they now sell-worthy. Perfectly cooked always. We called them « our meat ».

Naturally, first one must gather wood. Maize cane and wild fennel fuel lacked sufficient warmth. Still that was youngest’s task. Elders all learned trades. Thus, gathering wood fell unto me, if house needed warmth. What years those of ‘twenty-eight and twenty-nine and thirty!...

One day committed gravest error of my childhood. Mid-afternoon. A day, seemingly, like others; under semi-gray skies. A midseason solitude. Neither winter nor yet spring. A day of indefinable sadness, like hibernating animals. Felt acutely toil of those viral and restless and mysterious seasons. Outward seeming peace, inner you brood the tumult of adolescence. Near becoming a monster, though not yet man, perhaps for my special circumstances never been a boy. That day hunger more than usual. Eaten polenta and barley, not enough. Maybe grownups managed somehow, but I! Village held but few souls, one by inn portal, a woman drawing water from the small channel, surely for animals. Watched carefully from my door: none would see me. Our table smooth, clean, immense. A handful of yellow flour in the chest. No pantry possessed. Left without word. Seven, eight houses further dwelt a large family deemed friendly by mine. I thought: « Maybe they... ». Among many, two peers my age seemed not worst towards me. « Maybe they... ». At first feigned having arrived for afternoon play with companions. Some family still sat at the table: a large surface covered in remnants after a great meal, truly peasant-like meal. I circled the vast kitchen, scenting, discreetly, naturally, and speaking inevitably disconnected words, merely to hide true internal urges shouting. The two companions still ate, looking from above, sated. Pondering now, must have been so for poor Lazarus at rich man’s table. None offered, not even crumbs. Then dared, driven by desperation and secret tears. Consumed all with eyes, now nearly humid and veiled. Wish hadn’t extended that hand! When a woman’s harsh voice: « Go away, sp...» shouted rising and pulling platter aside. My unfortunate face blazed suddenly like a furnace. Felt lost, once more, like bathed high against the grain by my father. Legs were again wooden, yet somehow fled through the door. Outside others stood, under the porch, starting a siesta. Recall carts, plows, forks. For a moment all seemed to have set in motion, with noise of metal against me. Even they, as jest, clapped and cawed, speeding my run still more. Felt fear incarnate, cast upon deserted road, racing deeper by inertia’s force. Stopped only when near the church. From that farmhouse's portal emerged only two companions, also running, to deride and yell my once again horrid nickname like a black revelation. Halted and grabbed stones to hurl their way. Now friends again, but could have devoured them that day. Instead, took road to cemetery, without knowing course. Homeward, bearing that face? Poor dear mother! To other companions? The priest? Often I went to priest, since years already; he was among first to love me, protect, and offering something in exchange for help in the rectory and for daily mass service: a faithful service as of a dog, chased from all other doors. God, how I loved, consequently, that priest!... Instead, that day wandered fields: behind cemetery, along Ledra channel. Near the mill I detoured to be unobserved. Finally wept; reclined at acacia base, and how I cried that day.

My father already searching for grazing. My father joked not, though rarely raised hands. Imagined hearing even sheep’s bleating, they being hungry. How I understood and what a pity! Rather than return home, in sudden spur, arose and hastened toward town’s end; toward the « friend » dangling eternally from crude cross, swaying above fresh green tender wheat. What happened that evening can’t recall verbatim. All pent-up despair unloaded: was like some dense, dark band lifting from eyes. Despair’s void filled with rage, exultation, galloping force throughout body. Vision became bright, lucid, fixed, couldn’t tell on what mirage. Seemed a new voice rumbled within. Difficult stating bond, convergence, perhaps unity of these aspects. Field edges already sprouted tenderly some wild daisy, dog’s-eye. Desolate soul’s plain, that poverty-devastated desert perhaps marked my life’s foremost flourishing.

Was before him. Already sighted afar. Along path collected sharp, mean stones. Hands and coat’s noble pockets full. Now within range, began hurling them at him, precisely, shouting: « I am no sp... I am no sp... ». A stone, two, five stones. Blasted off the Alpine cap. A bump bore now on forehead. Yelled: « I am like the others!... ».

Smashed an arm with precise throw: dangled like bad thief’s post-execution blow hanging. « I’ll leave this whole village, I’ll disregard them all. Become larger than them! ». Thus spoke. Village forgive. Village wasn’t at fault. Boy’s game.

Yet that hunger and name!... Uttered thus: « I will feed all poor children! » Spoke precisely thus, in lucid rage. How can a boy’s mystery be explained? Naturally, aware of nothing. Was rebellion, need to defeat oppression. Instead life imparts opposite lessons. Defeat oppression? But when and who will work the miracle?

Meanwhile, his face was all shredded by my stones. Unsatiated. Wanted him in pieces, grounded, never to see him turn, like a sundial, wind-sunned; hear him no more on gloomy wintry nights. A stone broke his waist and he fell. Some tatters bled from crossed woods. Then I stomped his whole body with clogs, stomped while saying: « Is it over, eh! Now I’m a man too ». Yet, eventually, again felt pity for myself. No, that evening, not satisfied, remember well, unsure how spent that singular night...

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