Rob MacKillop
Edinburgh Correspondent
Still, I prefer this poinsettia in split-toned b&w. I have to keep feeding the ogre that is Gianluca, who demands new photos every day! 
Incredible reds - oops
- Thread starter Rob MacKillop
- Start date
Gianluca Drago
Well-Known Member
I'm a dragon, not an ogre, Rob, but keep feeding me anyway!
Rob MacKillop
Edinburgh Correspondent
Of course! How silly of me. I fear your fiery breath!
Gary Ayala
Well-Known Member
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Gianluca Drago
Well-Known Member
You should have no fear, in the end there is always a Saint George who humiliates me under the heel of his boot.
Rob MacKillop
Edinburgh Correspondent
That’s saints for you 
Gianluca Drago
Well-Known Member
Rob, you have many interesting vase holders. I love the vases in themselves, for the history they hold. One of them - identifying himself with the year he was dying in - said these words to me a few days ago....
"I am the container. You can see the scars on my shell from the passage of time. I am the empty vessel that has always lent itself to this, without protest. I have watched within me the things I have seen die, without ever dressing in mourning. From them, I have been tasted and changed. I have contained and cared for them with dedication, their life remains in my rind as a mark, but it does not belong to me. A mould, a crust, a chip are traces of a biological path that was theirs, in the face of a mineral and moral ageing that remains in me. Matter that was theirs, which is now my history.
Muddy peat, moist clay, dry sand. Fired clay, I am myself, in the end; in me, I have hosted whoever was here. Dry water, cold sun, blind light. Give me any plant, and let its vigorous and strong roots once again fill my darkness, in the company of ecstatic mushrooms, the small earth crustaceans they call piglets, delicate yeasts, and centipedes tracing my inner circumference in a circle, and batteries of bacteria, glass snails, silverfishes, shy midges, and tiny creatures here and there. With the cold of night, the heat rarely... Vertical horizon, the surface of life that I stubbornly remain for them all.
They scarify me, seeds that grew humbly and seeds that sacrificed themselves as martyrs in the scent of humus. My exposed flesh wrinkles, and while I die (a blind container of myself), tonight I fill up with memories and sweat lime. Sleep hypnotises me now.
All is well, it is a beautiful way to leave this world, in its final moments, sweet, savoury, and lovable.
I am a container, I make way for 2025 and the populations of new growths that will inhabit it.
Goodbye, happy New Year."
"I am the container. You can see the scars on my shell from the passage of time. I am the empty vessel that has always lent itself to this, without protest. I have watched within me the things I have seen die, without ever dressing in mourning. From them, I have been tasted and changed. I have contained and cared for them with dedication, their life remains in my rind as a mark, but it does not belong to me. A mould, a crust, a chip are traces of a biological path that was theirs, in the face of a mineral and moral ageing that remains in me. Matter that was theirs, which is now my history.
Muddy peat, moist clay, dry sand. Fired clay, I am myself, in the end; in me, I have hosted whoever was here. Dry water, cold sun, blind light. Give me any plant, and let its vigorous and strong roots once again fill my darkness, in the company of ecstatic mushrooms, the small earth crustaceans they call piglets, delicate yeasts, and centipedes tracing my inner circumference in a circle, and batteries of bacteria, glass snails, silverfishes, shy midges, and tiny creatures here and there. With the cold of night, the heat rarely... Vertical horizon, the surface of life that I stubbornly remain for them all.
They scarify me, seeds that grew humbly and seeds that sacrificed themselves as martyrs in the scent of humus. My exposed flesh wrinkles, and while I die (a blind container of myself), tonight I fill up with memories and sweat lime. Sleep hypnotises me now.
All is well, it is a beautiful way to leave this world, in its final moments, sweet, savoury, and lovable.
I am a container, I make way for 2025 and the populations of new growths that will inhabit it.
Goodbye, happy New Year."
Rob MacKillop
Edinburgh Correspondent
That is beautiful, Gianluca, one of the best responses possibly triggered from an image of mine. Although poetic, it is just a step away from being a poem, which might render it even more fragile?
Sweat lime or sweet lime?
Sweat lime or sweet lime?
Gianluca Drago
Well-Known Member
Thank you, Rob, but, I have to be honest, this is something I had written before I saw your photo. Nevertheless your photo brought it back to my mind.
‘Sweat’ vs ‘sweet’: I was writing in Italian and after, for my comment, I used an online translator (Deepl) and even though I looked at its translation I didn't put as much attention into it as I should have. The original sentence did contain the verb ‘to sweat’, but the subject ‘I’ is lost in translation, and then perhaps it should have been ‘I ooze limescale’ in the original intent.
I'm glad you enjoyed this little meditation on the passage of time.
