La persistenza della forma
Italiano
The water in the canal today held the shape of the boat long after the boat had passed — a valley pressed into the surface, un'impronta, the way wax holds the seal when the seal is lifted away. I watched it close. Not quickly. A slow forgetting, the water returning to itself by degrees, and I thought: this is what memory does, this is what the body does, this is what — but the thought arrived at something I could not complete without lying, so I let it go the way the water let the shape go, which is to say not all at once, and not entirely.
English
The water in the canal today held the shape of the boat long after the boat had passed — a valley pressed into the surface, un'impronta, the way wax holds the seal when the seal is lifted away. I watched it close. Not quickly. A slow forgetting, the water returning to itself by degrees, and I thought: this is what memory does, this is what the body does, this is what — but the thought arrived at something I could not complete without lying, so I let it go the way the water let the shape go, which is to say not all at once, and not entirely.
