“Olivetti Lettera” by Ron Padgett:
Good-bye, little Lettera.
It was nice with you again.
I once loved a girl and oh
Well I once loved a girl.You are so small, the way
what I remember is
packed into my human skull
and it’s dark in there.And it’s singing in there,
this typewriter who is a
girl, then, an Italian girl,
undressing, slowly, in the dark.
(From Collected Poems © 2013 by Ron Padgett. Used by permission of Coffee House Press. Photo of an Olivetti Lettera typewriter by Luca Violetto)
This picture, from DigitalGlobe via Getty Image, is of Mount Vesuvius on 19 February 2013. It was voted as the best satellite image of last year.
The very beautiful Corricella harbour on the small island of Procida.
The setting for the film Il Postino, Corricella is a photographer’s dream; a working harbour of fishing boats, small pastel-coloured houses, no cars, deep blue skies and a few simple cafes along the water’s edge. For lunch, take the 1300 ferry from Pozzuoli and you can sit down at just after two o’clock for a leisurely meal of assorted, sparklingly fresh shell fish, pasta with fresh anchovies and tomatoes and an assortment of fried fish. After a carafe of ‘vigorous’ white wine and a glass of homemade limoncello, you can catch the 1700 ferry back to the mainland.
We always eat at ‘Vincenzo’s’ or Bar Graziella. Simple, with white plastic chairs set under wide umbrellas, the charismatic eponymous owner is a local legend and always dressed in a white singlet. He was a part time film actor and inside the restaurant, an old fisherman’s cave, there are plenty of photos of Vincenzo with various celebrities who have visited his bar.
Down at the local green grocers yesterday, I saw that the pere coscia or Coscia pears had arrived. These are small, firm, sweet pears which are in season from late Summer until the beginning of Autumn. They go well raw, with gorgonzola, or in a salad. In their honour, what better way to cook them than in the classic manner, poached in some Italian red wine, cooled and then eaten with vanilla gelato. Recipe after the jump.
‘Lost to a world in which I crave no part, I sit alone and commune with my heart. Pleased with my little corner of earth, glad to have come, not sorry to depart’.
DH Lawrence.
La Pedamentina di San Martino which runs from Castel Sant’Elmo and the former Carthusian monastery of San Martino down into Naples. Photo via Napoli Today.
Snapped by the author whilst strolling along Lungomare on a lovely Summer’s evening.
High above the famously twisty Amalfi coast road, along which coaches whizz tourists on day trips to and from picturesque Amalfi and Sorrento, lies a simpler, more remote Italy. The seven-kilometre long Pathway of the Gods runs down from the heights of Agerola (Bomerano) to the beach at Positano. Of medium difficulty (at least downhill), the local legend tells how the Gods descended the rocky path to reach the sea where Sirens lay in wait for unsuspecting mariners, enticing entranced sailors onto the rocks with the beauty of their singing. When Odysseus foiled them by lashing himself to the mast of his ship, the Sirens threw themselves into the sea, becoming the Le Sirenuse isles.
A beautiful HD stroll through downtown Naples – the Centro Storico.
Broken Columns 