"I am imagining where it all could have started. Here. Or here. Or all the way back there. The first place where I thought I’d found the beginning was inside the chiesa. Santa Maria Assunta. The aunts would whisper it like an incantation. Before I could remember having arrived, I would smell it. The incense curling out from its openings. Before I was baptized and bound to it, it was already in my skin. And I had to find the flame. I looked for it in the rocks by the river. How many forces have found you? I looked for it inside of picture frames. Where did you come from? I looked for it in the faded figure in the fresco. How long will you last? What moment would I want to freeze inside of a frame? Me at the window: waiting for you to arrive. Us leaving each other—and our love lingering on. I would not frame it. I could not fix it. And so I free it."
xo - Otea
