Venice in Peril

“Paris may change, but in my melancholy mood
Nothing has budged! New palaces, blocks, scaffoldings,
Old neighbourhoods, are allegorical for me,
And my dear memories are heavier than stone”
(Baudelaire, “The Swan”)

Here in Venice, the water is closing in and everything is either dying or already living dead. Abandoned before the flooding, in the abandoned hotel, white cloth has been draped over the furniture. The mood is funeral despite the good nature of the inefficient Italian staff.

Time and again, I return to the fish market, which I have adopted as the centre of my Venice. This year, large red swathes of material have been hung on columns, giving the impression of an open-air surgical theatre.

Behind the scenes, large chunks of disgusting fish flesh are being dissected and displayed. The smell is conforming, due to its overwhelming rancour. Down below, however, smaller cuttings have made their way into the gaps of the surgical tables. As a result, a cluster of fresh claws and entrails have been caught up amid the cigarette ends in the drains.

Despite its morbid peril, the city casts a long shadow from the past. Here, for instance, is the place where I saw a large bird come to the end of its life five years ago.

I remember: its eyes pulsating, while its throat tightened. The more it suffered with a shortage of air, so the greater its eyes protruded from its small cranium. At the same time, the water that was trapped in its lungs prevented the bird from resuming flight. Instead, on a small corner of the Rialto Bridge, its wings flapped erratically on the concrete, sometimes managing to move an inch either way. Eventually, the step that it lay on formed a seamless current with the canal. At that point, the still juddering frame of the bird was suddenly collected by the lapping waves. The last thing: the agonised bird, its heavy wings, now drenched, beating on the surface of the shit stained canal, with one last throe of energy, flip over onto its front before dying.

At the San Michele cemetery meanwhile, the air is thick with eroticism and ritual. As new ground is being tugged out by diggers, in the background I can hear a simple melody coming from an electric greeting card. The card must have been blown by the wind, since the melody is caught in a loop.

Although a well fortified island, San Michele cemetery is also suffering from the flooding. The graves are moist here, and when walking around the perimeter of the island, one needs to tread with caution, in order to avoid slipping onto the sacred patch of soil where the dead rests.