It’s raining

“It’s raining,
not on a lovely fairy tale
from distance seasons
but on tax
demands.
It’s raining on cuttlefish bones
and on the crib of the nation.”

Eugenio Montale

Days and nights are also made of words. Pronounced, repeated so many times they are almost no longer heard:
“Good night, sweet dreams.
Good morning. Did you sleep well?
See you later.
Are you coming home for lunch?
We’ll talk about that later. We’re not pressed for time.
I’ll stop by the supermarket. Can I use the car?
I’ll drop the kids off at their grandparents’.
Sorry, I’m in a rush…
Watch out, they say it’s going to rain.
They always say that but it never rains. There’s so much drought around that if a fire breaks out, we’ll be needing luck.
Hey, do you remember what grandma used to say? She was born in the Po delta: “Water stays away years and months, but sooner or later it comes back home.”
Sooner or later. Water returns.
Just that the water gives no warning when it decides to come back and take over spaces it believes belong to it.
It just comes. All at once.
How great, it’s raining! And it no longer rains like it once did…
In the past you could go on holiday and you’d know when it was going to rain, and HOW it would rain. The first storm would break mid-August. With lightning and thunder. How wonderful, and how frightening it was! “Don’t hang around under trees, and shut the window. Your aunt had a lightning bolt pass right through the house, from the kitchen to the dining room. Thank goodness your uncle wasn’t in his usual armchair, reading the paper.”
And then the northerly winds would come. The air was cooler. In the past. In winter, frost would form on the window panes. In the past. We could know everything. Even if that time in Florence… and that time the Po River… And in Genoa too…
Well, never mind, I have to be off. Oh, look… it’s raining.

Everything’s normal. Just as it always is.

And then, suddenly, the other words start coming. Already repeated so many times that you almost no longer hear them.

Surge. Water. Mud. Flooding. Tragedy. Apocalypse. Disaster. Hell.
Words. The same words each time. Always those ones.

They die together. Father and son. They’re in their garage when the SURGE hits them.
She loses her life while trying to shut the ground-floor windows, the WATER enters her home without even asking permission.
Instead they’re in their car. The mud sweeps them away. The wheels skid, and nothing will be as it was before. Actions repeated a thousand times. Names used a thousand times. My hands. My mouth.
The mud.
My eyes. My hair.
The mud.
Clothes. Shoes. A handbag. A school bag.
The mud.
The words. The sweet dreams. See you tonight.
The mud.
‘Tonight’ no longer exists. There is just mud.
Surge. Water. Mud. They are no longer just words. They are the fine line between life and never again.
Tragedy. Apocalypse. Disaster. Hell.
Since when has water no longer been my friend?

The relief efforts.
The delays.
Accountability.
The television channels. The newspapers. The names. The victims. The missing.
First one hundred. And another hundred. Orderly commotion. And another hundred. Volunteers.
Colour returns with them.
Amidst the mud.
And me? Where am I?

Help me understand. I NEED to understand. I NEED to understand.
I need to be there, to listen. And to be listened to.
Help me.

Good night, sweet dreams.
My grandma came from the Po delta.