Tre cose strane

[darkemeralds]

Three strange things happened on my way to work this morning.

I saw a dead crow in the middle of the road.

The sun came out.

I passed a mezzo-soprano practicing in Waterfront Park.

I was so struck by the strange magic of the other two things that I stopped, turned around, and went back to ask her what she was singing. She, it turns out, was a young man with sweet, wild features, his blue nylon windbreaker hood pulled up around his face. He finished his song as I listened.

"What are you singing?"

"Amarilli mia bella," he said, "by Giulio Caccini. He wrote it not very long after Columbus came to America."

We spoke for a few moments, he made sure I had the song title right ("It's standard," he said. "You can find it in Twenty-Four Italian Songs and Arias." "I had that book once!" I replied. "Well, find it again," said he); I thanked him for singing and he thanked me for riding my bike, and I went on to work.

I don't know how to weave these three things together yet.

Comments

[ravurian]

On the way home from dinner last night, on the walk back from the station, my sister suddenly lurched sideways and stopped, foot paused mid-step above the corpse of a sparrow on the pavement. It was leaning down as if bowing, wings tucked in, beak touching the pavement. It wasn't lying on its side as it might have been if it had been snatched from the air by a cat. It wasn't flattened or crushed as it might have been if it had been hit by a car. It looked for all the world as if it had just got tired and was resting its head against the ground. I suppose that birds must die of natural causes all the time, but I don't think I've ever seen the corpse of one before. We looked at it for a moment and then carried on walking. At the next bus stop, my sister's girlfriend got off the bus. It wasn't her stop, and she hadn't seen us, but we all three coincided randomly. I thought that this was probably significant, since before the bird and before the bus, we had been talking about their relationship. Hmm.

I like that your singer thanked you for riding your bike. Such courtesy!

I wonder if your events could be summarised thus: the death of your old life; a fresh light: see what's written on your heart.

[darkemeralds]

Magical morning/magical evening.

see what's written on your heart.

The letters there are awfully weathered. I'll have to read them by feel.