Eva Colombo, Flowers and sea, fifth chapter: Ariadne’s poppies ( Inspired by
John William Waterhouse’s painting Ariadne, 1898)
Dawn light grazed the night sky like a rose which grazes the sea. Above the
horizon, the star Sirius was burning like the eyes of who have just passed a
summer night staring at the dark with wide – open eyes so that the dark may be
mirrored by those eyes and in this way soothing the loneliness which is damned
to suffer by the too much long summer days. Then the sun disclosed the poppies’
corolla and you fell asleep listening to the hypnotic humming of the bees. You
dreamed of falling into an abyss and yet you didn’t abandon yourself to despair
since you had noticed on the bottom of that abyss a mother – of – pearl glow
sent forth by an huge fossil of an ammonite shell. And you danced following the
spiral of the shell and it was as ascending the Bovolo staircase, in Venice. You
arrived at the top, you saw the sea. You reversed the line of the dance, you
descended the staircase. And you reached the sea. The sea which remembers
presented you with your past as if it were the greenest seaweed, the brightest
hope for your future. When you opened your eyes again the sea drenched with the
setting sun was wine – colored. The poppies quivering at the touch of the bees
were like chalices overflowing with a wine as sweet as honey, hypnotic like the
swash of the sea. You met the eye of a man who was brave enough not to be afraid
of falling into the abyss of your eyes. And he saw that the spark of love into
your huge dark eyes was like a star which shines into a labyrinth, and he knew
that freedom is the gift of your love. |