Democratic License by Edward Drobinski - HTML preview

Page 258

both locals and tourists, on the first level, which said; “Ruga dell Ultimo Balla,” and I was drifting toward a small isolated island just off its shore. As I got closer and was better able to make out the shapes, though still in the mist, I realized I have seen this somewhere before. The image in front of my eyes was like a black and white version of Arnold Bocklin’s painting and now I was being transported to his Isle of the Dead.

My gondola docked itself, as if guided by an unseen, thereby naked bot, at a jagged indentation in the shoreline, like one that could have been created by a harried laborer using the wrong tools. I exited with all the confidence of an experienced teleporter temporarily sidetracked to a personally well-known location. There was a comforting, deep silence. I could only

Democratic License Page 259

hear the very faint stirring of the sluggish water as the gondola rocked gently while it floated over it. Suddenly, there was also a faint melody which became clearer as I regained my land legs, and I now recognized Sergei Rachmaninov’s symphonic poem that grew directly out of the painting, with its Dies Irae.

This poem was also in black and white in spite of all its easily hearable harmonic colors.

As I walked further into the island, I saw amongst the dark, thin, and tall trees a palace constructed of a material which seemed unknown to me. The air was chilly, not cold, not freezing, just crisp and sharp, as one would expect of a late October evening anywhere in the temperate zone.

It was like being in an Aubrey Beardsley illustration. As the unattended front door was left seductively open I climbed the steep stairs and entered this palace and upon seven common and ordinary steps I was in a salon, a dancing salon. Around it there were seven adjacent chambers or alcoves and there were hammocks in which I saw several figures lying down, horizontally. They are the “horizontals,” the blessed in their stability. Although I am moving in space, there is something flat, like a fresco in a medieval church or maybe this flattened perspective is my illusion. Out of nowhere a familiar song played in my head.

Democratic License