Goliarda Sapienza - The Art of Joy

‘I’m your gold mine, and you should be thinking only of me now that I’m your treasure.’

‘Don’t you feel me holding you in my arms like my life’s gold?’

He burrows between my thighs and the gold of my youth comes to light in his hands. Alone by day, remembering his face amid the fields and sunlight, at night in his arms, which smell of hay and tobacco.

‘Tobacco, Modesta? Naturally, all I do is smoke! Tobacco is all that’s left to me.’

‘What about me?’

‘You’re something else.’

‘What am I?’

‘You’re my youth, which doesn’t want to leave me. It clings to your skin, youth does! Even if you’re aware of the years, youth calls you, and you’re driven to pursue it. And all it takes is some little thing to give you the illusion you’ve found it, and you let yourself be deceived. You can’t help it.’

‘I’m young, aren’t I, Carmine?’

‘Of course! What do you think?’

‘At times I feel old.’

‘Definitely a condition of youth! The younger you are, the older you feel, sometimes. But you have to be careful, because feeling old makes you old. Like my son Vincenzo: he came back from the war healthy and strong, and in a year he became old and miserable, living with that skinny signorinella who’s always scowling and fainting.’

‘Listen to this old man blaming his son! You’re the one who married him off to that little carusa from Modica. All the girls from Modica are like that, skinny and dreary. Didn’t you know that?’

‘But this carusa from Modica brought us sizeable lands. And he should know the power it brought him, the joy and pride of bolstering my efforts and those of my father and grandfather with his wife’s money. Today’s new landowners are my sons and…’

‘The Tudia are replacing the old estate holders, listen to that! And in time, with greater sacrifices, you Tudia will even become aristocrats, right?’

‘Of course! A Tudia should take pride in riding from dawn to dusk without ever leaving the boundaries of his lands, and not let women’s whining and lamenting make him miserable. Ride his horse, and seek his pleasure outside the home.’

‘I hate you, Carmine!’

‘That’s nothing new. It’s always been that way between us.’

‘And it always will be that way! Why are you laughing, eh, old man? What’s that laughter in your eyes?’

‘I’m laughing at your hatred, figghia . If only I’d had a daughter like you!’

‘What do you mean?’

‘That you hate me because, as the Princess, God rest her soul, realized…’

‘What did she realize?’

‘That Mody is exactly like Carmine. Two peas in a pod.’

‘I’m not like you, Carmine! Times are changing, and I hope that your sons, your grandchildren and all the other young people will overthrow you landowners and do away with your estates.’

‘Listen to her! And who put these ideas in your head, your brother-in-law? Or did you read about them in books? And what would you gain from it, eh, Princess Brandiforti?’

‘I would have a good laugh over it.’

‘Those ideas are foreign, Modesta. And nothing good ever came to the island from outside. You did well to ally yourself through Beatrice’s marriage to a person of some importance, who might have friends in high places one day soon.’

‘Carlo would never sell himself out!’

‘I swear to God, you sound just like Mattia! Always getting worked up over someone, you picciriddi ! You with this socialist Carlo, and Mattia with his Mussolini. They’re foreigners, outsiders! Just this morning, I put an end to the Black Shirt that had gotten under Mattia’s skin and in his mind, with a sound thrashing! Naturally, they have to give him money, because this Mussolini is the only one who can ensure order here — he’s a real Crispi, I swear to God! — but not their souls … He’s turned to the young with subtle cunning, and inflamed their imaginations against the old. He was shrewd, because ever since the world began the young have been quick to catch fire. Sure! Give a young man an Orlando and a Rinaldo, make him dream with new words and new uniforms, let him believe that he will be boss, and he’ll become your slave without knowing it.’

‘There’s truth in what you say, Carmine, but there’s also truth in what Carlo says. And his truth agrees with me more.’

‘So be it! But this truth is being told too slowly. Too many watered-down words are coming out of their mouths. Young people, since the world began, have always needed myths and heroic deeds. That’s what worries me about Mattia. He must use his head, look after his interests and not let himself be taken in.’

‘I don’t give a fig about you and your Mattia, and all the old men like you! I know Carlo is right, and you can’t understand.’

‘But I do understand, and I can read, Modesta. Don’t make me angry! Their plans are too grandiose, and they’re moving ahead too uncertainly.’

‘Not in Russia. There, heads have been broken, Carmine.’

‘Well! Russia is a long way off! And it should stay a long way off from the island! I repeat my question, figghia : what would you gain from having the landowners overthrown?’

‘I told you. I would have a good laugh over it.’

‘And how would you get by without means? What would you leave your son?’

‘I’m not leaving anything to my son. He’ll study. He’ll work like Carlo does.’

‘And what about you?’

‘I’ll work too. I told you! I hate you!’

‘And who is it that you love? This Carlo?’

‘If I need to, I’ll work. You can’t understand.’

‘On the contrary, Carmine does understand. Only one thing surprises him.’

‘What’s that?’

‘With these ideas of yours, wouldn’t you have been better off staying in the convent and becoming a nun, figghia ?’

‘I hate you, Carmine.’

‘That’s the way it’s always been between us.’

‘No! This is genuine hate, Carmine. It’s no longer submission toward you, this hatred, because I’ve grown up and I know you’re my enemy.’

‘Who told you these things? Your friend from Milan?’

‘A man who is not a landowner told me!’

‘If I understand correctly, you love Carlo, but you want me. How can that be, Modesta?’

‘I love Carlo, and my nature wants you. I’ve learned not to fight my nature: I satisfy it but I don’t give it my soul, as you say. I satisfy it with your kisses, I satiate it and when it’s sated I clear my mind and set you aside. Why do you think I let you come back? Did you think, you, with your landowner’s arrogance, that I let you come back so I could be your gold mine for ever? No! It was to finish the story that you had broken off because it pleased you. To take what I had coming to me, then send you away.’

‘That’s what I want, too. That’s why I let you beat me up and insult me. I want to have my fill of you, and when I’m satisfied, go away. I’m a condemned man, figghia . Don’t forget that.’

‘It’s not true! I haven’t seen one sign of it these past months, either in your body or in your mind. It was a lie so you could come back.’

‘If you want to believe that, if it soothes you to think so, go ahead. But now that you’re all in a lather, let me kiss you.’

‘Don’t act like a sheep, Carmine; you’re a wolf! Take what you can get, but don’t act like you have to ask. Kiss me for as long as my nature wants you, because later, maybe in a month, maybe in an hour, I’ll impose the death sentence I gave you before. I’ll be the one to kill you, not La Certa ! I’m young. You said so, and I’ll never let anyone own me!’