A flash of lightening, rumbles of thunder and a water-bomb storm.
Tv gone, internet, electric lights, heating. The virtual world gone completely. Thank goodness the fire was alight. Us poor souls that still keep a lit fire to see flickers and flames, whilst others have replaced them with sterile, similar, false and fake electric fires. Ours offers us a glimmer of primordial light and intense warmth.

Where are the torches? The candles? Nothing... taken completely unprepared by an unexpected rebellion of nature…

What's the point of you going around flicking the fused light switches up and down, or making improbable conversations with stuck telephonic recordings that ask you for series of unknown numbers and letters? I put twenty chestnuts, survivors of the newly arrived parasite that has come from  the other side of the World, onto the embers and I breathe in the intense perfume of Autumn.

Get that bottle of fruity and mellow red wine will you? I'll bring the peeled chestnuts. Get under the blankets. The pelting outside is heavy, almost vindictive. Let's shut ourselves in here, skin to skin, and wait till it blows over, that it gets back to normal, or maybe not. Maybe this is normal life. That helps us in the wait for nothing.

Too many questions, hand me my glass, don't get crumbs in the bed, caress me.

It had turned dark at the Osteria there in Campo Marzio, I was eating bruscolini and drinking Frascati, when Giggetto from Monti approached me and comes out with something like this ''You know Adele left me for Sorcio, from San Giovanni'', and he's really upset. Giggetto is a good bloke, stocky but a loner and always polite enough.
''Don't let it get at you Giggè, drink this Frascati, not much you can do about it. Leave it out, Adele didn't deserve you.''
''Who cares about Adele'' he says '' a man that after 5 minutes is still thinking about a woman aint' a man..but what about my honor? what will people say?''
''Don't bother about that'' I tell him, ''Sorcio is a bright spark, I've seen him as fast as a bolt of lightening. You know Giggè I'm not frightened even of the Devil, but leave it out..have a drink, cop a hold of these bruscolini.''
The day after I found out that Giggetto had challenged the Sorcio in a shop in Trastevere and the rat had killed him, just like that.
A week later when I went dancing on the boats down at the Tiberina. Maria, my girl with pubes as black as a crow, tits as white as milk and silky legs that are all mine, was all dolled up.
The night was going well, everyone knows my breath ain't sweet and a troublemaker tried to rub me up the wrong way, a dark haired guy from the Casilina started to pick a fight. I've had to deal with that before. 
He tries it on with Maria, he wants her to dance and shows off.
So I go up to him.
''So, what's up with you? Got something to say have you old man?''
Maria clings to my side and everyone stops dancing and silence falls.
She says ''Here Romolo, I reckon you need a knife''.
But I don't pick it up, I look at it and then turn to the dark haired guy and I say,
''Pack it in''. Try saying that I'm scared if you want, say what you like, but I turn and leave. I'm gone. I've lived in the Castelli ever since. People are quieter.

Bruscolini are salted pumpkin seeds
Tiberina refers to the Tiberina Island in the middle of the Tiber River.

Bets and Perfume

I would have thrown in the towel then. Fuck you Post office, and you bald old boss with your stink of peanut butter.
Get out of bed Buk, I told myself on the third day. Dig out your sweepstake, the track has already answered plenty of your most complicated problems.
I betted with cunning, no shit, just how a real winner should. Five in a row on a couple of martingales I managed to hit. Little on the loser, a lot on the favorite with an eye on the tote…horses are for professionals, not like posting a few letters chased by dogs or jotting down a few ass-licking lines!
That was a real inspired period, Tuesday and Thursday I'd raise my couple of hundred bucks, then you bet the bed welcomed me happily, sausages and white wine kept me company. Then one Tuesday I met her. Lean, with tall withers, her nipples pricked her tight grey jumper, her calfs went way up above the slit in her skirt and her blond hair went down to meet them.
She had just recovered from a bad accident, she had had others and I just went head on, consciously, without brakes, knowing straight away that I would have enjoyed the ride but come out really badly, just like a sure winner. I downed a glass of Frascati, there at the track bar and ran to meet her.

I pulled it slowly, without spilling a drop. Slowly it rose up the tankard, vermillion red, perfumes of rose-hip, blackberry and raspberry that fill the cellar.

The salami sliced thick and fragrant bread, on a dark wooden board, a pagan altar to a simple joy of sharing a sublime pleasure.

Sit down. Pass me your glass, I'll pour you a drop of this red emotion, break the bread, take some, friend - taste my blood, establish this not disrespectful communion with me. See, the World that divided us now seems more shareable: a small miracle is happening, we are living a happy moment. Something now so rare in this bedlam that we call life. Drink and eat, tell me your stories. Yeah, we can now truly claim to be blood-brothers.