After settling in at the San Domenico, a hotel built as a monastery in the fifteenth century with a view of the water, we visit the Greek theater, built into the side of a hill, the sea flashing azure in the distance, the columns of the stage framing what would have been a magnificent view of Etna, had it not been fogged in. It wasn’t until dark, when I slipped out onto my balcony to take in a breath of the fragrant air, that I saw evidence of the volcano, the distant orange of molten lava through the dark. “A jagged scribble of fire,” I wrote in my notebook, feeling suddenly the surge that comes when my imagination hooks up to a possible image.
I wondered what Margarett would have been thinking seeing these same sights. She never resumed painting and never had another exhibition during her lifetime. I’ve known that forever, but here, now, after a life full of the satisfactions of writing and teaching young writers, thinking about her life makes me terribly sad. This image of fire may not turn up in my writing, but I know that I will find my way again to my desk and to the wonderful silence that tells me I’m going to start another poem or write another book.
Etna is still fogged in the next morning when we take an exploratory walk down the Via Bagnoli Croce toward the ocean, only to stumble upon an unexpected marvel: the public gardens. Set overlooking the sea, the park is a maze of cedar, palm and exotic plants, and its pathways are a mosaic of multicolored pebbles. Half-hidden are Victorian follies, small houses for picnics or tea parties, constructed of bits of lava, stone and architectural fragments that reprise Sicily’s heritage: the Greek, the Arabic, the Roman. Exotic ducks swim in a tiny pond, and a flock of green parrots resides in one of the follies. When I step out to the palisade, I can almost see Margarett gazing at the changing light of the Mediterranean. “Nothing equalled the day I left,” she wrote, “when the sea looked like a maddened opal—still & wild simultaneously. Everything excites me so superbly here . . . ”
