Eva Colombo, As light wherever touches shadow, fifth chapter: Lilith’s cloud
Lilith, the Sumerian female demon associated with storm wind and lust, on the
Italian Adriatic shore gives her features to a couple of Gabriele d’Annunzio’s
characters. Francesca da Rimini, protagonist of the tragedy named after her (
1901 ) greets the Adriatic storm as a relative and appears as a wind storm
herself in the erotic dreams of her torturer, Malatestino. But Malatestino
doesn’t see her only as lust and destruction, but also as a promise of a life
lived with “full veins”, “and with the wind and the victorious days”. As if
Francesca were a lustful storm which pushes men towards a superhuman life, far
away from mediocrity. Basiliola, protagonist of the tragedy La Nave [ The Ship,
1907 ], unleashes her revenge on the early citizens of Venice in the imminence
of a summer storm. It is June, the days before the summer solstice. Basiliola
appears before the eyes of her victims as a beautiful demon / goddess of deadly
lust and wind storm. Even her purple hair is a stormy cloud, the same purple
stormy cloud of Lilith’s hair in Aleister Crowley’s The temple of Solomon the
King ( 1904 ). At the end of the tragedy, Basiliola is defeated and imprisoned
and in order to escape an infamous punishment she throws herself into the fire.
While Basiliola is dying the Ship is weighing anchor, as if the fire had turned
her into the wind which pushes the Ship towards the glorious future of Venice.
Nowadays, the cloud of Basiliola – Lilith is still visible on the Venetian sky
during the days before the summer solstice. At twilight, the crescent of the
moon looks like the brim of a chalice full of the blood which the sun has shed
at sunset. Stormy clouds are ready to take over the sky and a cloud, just one
cloud, is the vanguard of the assault. She leaps on the moon, the chalice
overturns and the cloud is imbued with the blood of the sun. She sparkles bright
red for a moment and she reminds us that June nights are short, and precious. |
