Stromboli

Mum calls the day before the holiday. Unfortunately, she's watched the news. "You're not going to Etna are you?" 
 I told her the truth. "No! No. We're going to Naples and then we'll get a ferry to an island." 
The news in the UK did not mention the name of my island. The news in Italy did. 
She did not ask me the name of my island. I did not tell her the name of my island. 

Later, an unholy rumble - a roar - the sound of the earth being torn open. The sensation of a slow moving monster looming above, like the stop motion creations of Ray Harryhausen come real. Warning sirens. A thick black cloud rises to the heavens, blocking out the sun, and spreads like treacle across the clear blue sky. 

We watch the street as people rush inside. The carabinieri look like actors, rushing down to clear the tiny, rocky cove of people. They reappear, sweating in their berets and padded jackets. What a chore! Ten minutes pass and a older man appears squinting and sweating his way up the stone steps. He has a red face and the world in his belly. He wears a Norwegian flag on his shirt, to avoid any confusion. Under his arm rests a plastic, orange deckchair. He reaches the top of the steps and sighs the laboured breath of a man who is just so exhausted by it all. The sky rains powder onto my skin. The air smells of dust and sulphur.

The sirens stop. There is nothing but the sound of the waves washing onto the shore. A tear in the Earth drips lava into the sea until it doesn't anymore. 

 Home now and I see images of my dream, but as a nightmare. A cruel gallery of carnival mirrors cuts right through the core of the earth. 







// Paroxysm and pyroclastic flow, Stromboli, July 11th


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