undulate like a caterpillar getting the wings out of the caul, the new imago emerging from the random circumbendibus.
Also, this girl has a brother : he is several years younger, of the same open countenance but also fatter, weller, much less shadowed at the eyes, and dancing can be as catchy as laughing and I was not alone in this knowledge cause into the room came this small boy with long and brown curling hair to dance the same dance very badly (boy I know anatomically cause bare as a bacchus cherub from the midriff down) : he danced the dance badly and laughingly half naked round her till the girl, who could not hear him and did not know he was doing it till she opened her eyes and saw him, roared like a furious African cat, hit him over the head with her hand and chased him from the room, by which I gauged them sister and brother.
She started the dance again : she performed itsstrangeness with such deftness and attention that I was filled with verve by her taking of her own ups and downs so earnestly.
I’ve come to like this girl who will so solemnly dance with herself.
Right now she and I are outside the house that is home to her and the brother : we are sitting in a garden of shivering flowers.
Through the small window she holds in her hands we are viewing frieze after frieze of lifelike scenes of carnal pleasure-house love enacted before our eyes : the love act has not changed : no variation here is new to me.
Cold here and she’s shivering too : surmise she is watching the love act repeating like this to keep herself warm.
The little brother came out here too and by a single glance in his direction she both warned him and dismissed him : this is a girl with a very strong eye : he hasn’t gone far, he is behind a small wicker fence about as tall as he is, behind which there are tall black barrels hidden close to the door of the house and I think has some mischief planned : every so often he dashes out on to the grass in front of the fence and picks up a stone or twig then dashes back behind the fence and he has done this several times now without her noticing him once.
Girl, I remember it, the way the game of love makes the rest of the world disappear.
Bestnot to watch it through such a small window, though.
Best on the whole not to watch it at all : love is best felt : the acts of love are hard and disillusioning to view like this unless done by the greatest master picturemakers : otherwise the seeing of them being done and enjoyed by figurations of other people will always lock you outside them (unless your pleasure comes from taking solo pleasure or pleasure at one remove, in which case, yes, that’s your pleasure).
Now inevitably I am thinking of Ginevra, of most lovely Isotta, of silly little lovely little Meliadusa, and Agnola, and the others into whose company I came first in my 17th year the night Barto and I, having been to see the processions in Reggio, travelled back to the city and Barto took me to what he called
a fine place to spend the night
.
What do you think, Francescho, will we go and see the Marquis be celebrated becoming the Duke? Barto’d said.
I asked permission of my father cause I’d a longing to see a throng : he said no : he said it unblinkingly.
Tell him it’ll be good for your work, Barto said. We’ll go a journey and see history be made.
I repeated the gist of this to my father.
There’s much for a painter to see there, I said, and if you ever want me to get closer to the courtand its workshops there’s much I ought to know, much I ought not to miss.
My father shook his head : no.
If these fail, Barto said, tell him you’re going with me and that this is an intelligent thing to let a painter do cause the more chance my family has to see your skill – you’ll draw the procession, won’t you – the more chance there is they’ll give you work when you’re fledged. And tell him you’ll be away for only one night and that my parents will give you your lodging
Also, this girl has a brother : he is several years younger, of the same open countenance but also fatter, weller, much less shadowed at the eyes, and dancing can be as catchy as laughing and I was not alone in this knowledge cause into the room came this small boy with long and brown curling hair to dance the same dance very badly (boy I know anatomically cause bare as a bacchus cherub from the midriff down) : he danced the dance badly and laughingly half naked round her till the girl, who could not hear him and did not know he was doing it till she opened her eyes and saw him, roared like a furious African cat, hit him over the head with her hand and chased him from the room, by which I gauged them sister and brother.
She started the dance again : she performed itsstrangeness with such deftness and attention that I was filled with verve by her taking of her own ups and downs so earnestly.
I’ve come to like this girl who will so solemnly dance with herself.
Right now she and I are outside the house that is home to her and the brother : we are sitting in a garden of shivering flowers.
Through the small window she holds in her hands we are viewing frieze after frieze of lifelike scenes of carnal pleasure-house love enacted before our eyes : the love act has not changed : no variation here is new to me.
Cold here and she’s shivering too : surmise she is watching the love act repeating like this to keep herself warm.
The little brother came out here too and by a single glance in his direction she both warned him and dismissed him : this is a girl with a very strong eye : he hasn’t gone far, he is behind a small wicker fence about as tall as he is, behind which there are tall black barrels hidden close to the door of the house and I think has some mischief planned : every so often he dashes out on to the grass in front of the fence and picks up a stone or twig then dashes back behind the fence and he has done this several times now without her noticing him once.
Girl, I remember it, the way the game of love makes the rest of the world disappear.
Bestnot to watch it through such a small window, though.
Best on the whole not to watch it at all : love is best felt : the acts of love are hard and disillusioning to view like this unless done by the greatest master picturemakers : otherwise the seeing of them being done and enjoyed by figurations of other people will always lock you outside them (unless your pleasure comes from taking solo pleasure or pleasure at one remove, in which case, yes, that’s your pleasure).
Now inevitably I am thinking of Ginevra, of most lovely Isotta, of silly little lovely little Meliadusa, and Agnola, and the others into whose company I came first in my 17th year the night Barto and I, having been to see the processions in Reggio, travelled back to the city and Barto took me to what he called
a fine place to spend the night
.
What do you think, Francescho, will we go and see the Marquis be celebrated becoming the Duke? Barto’d said.
I asked permission of my father cause I’d a longing to see a throng : he said no : he said it unblinkingly.
Tell him it’ll be good for your work, Barto said. We’ll go a journey and see history be made.
I repeated the gist of this to my father.
There’s much for a painter to see there, I said, and if you ever want me to get closer to the courtand its workshops there’s much I ought to know, much I ought not to miss.
My father shook his head : no.
If these fail, Barto said, tell him you’re going with me and that this is an intelligent thing to let a painter do cause the more chance my family has to see your skill – you’ll draw the procession, won’t you – the more chance there is they’ll give you work when you’re fledged. And tell him you’ll be away for only one night and that my parents will give you your lodging
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