I'm afraid. I must confess that I'm afraid. On September 1st, it will be eighty-six years since the Second World War broke out. And now I'm afraid of the third. I'm already taking my last steps on the surface of this shattered world. But the truth is, I'm afraid. And the fact is that we're in the hands of a pair of psychotics playing to see who has the biggest chance, the Navy or whatever. Trump and Putin, both, could have an outburst at any moment and unravel the whole mess irreversibly. Trump deploys nuclear submarines to intimidate Putin, and Putin prepares his banned missiles. Ukraine will be the excuse. The truth is pride. And Gaza could be another excuse. It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter. Trump threatens the world with his tariffs, and Putin, with his drones. It doesn't matter. The truth is, I'm afraid.
Eighty-six years ago, the English poet—he was still English—W.H. Auden wrote a poem titled "September 1, 1939." In this poem, he says that "waves of rage and fear / circulate over the bright / and shadowed countries of the earth, / haunting our private lives; / the indefinable smell of death / offends the September night." It is precisely that indefinable smell of death that I smell in every television newscast. Stronger every day, permeating our everyday lives more and more, as they say.
Apart from this, the month of August has begun like every year. In Sant Feliu de Guíxols, where I live, the local festival has just passed, with its usual noise, the concerts, the correfocs (fireworks), and what they call batucadas (drum bands). And the rockets and firecrackers of the fireworks. Like every year. The town—or city, or whatever—is teeming with vacationers and holidaymakers of all kinds, colors, and languages—predominantly French and English. But it also feels Italian, apart from the usual ones: Spanish, which dominates everything, increasingly so; Arabic, which will perhaps soon dominate everything; and a bit of Ukrainian, of course. And others I can't distinguish.
It's getting hot again. The beach is packed to the rafters. The bar terraces are full, the seasonal waiters are zooming from one table to another. The weathermen—and women—threaten us with even more heat. But they say, they remind us, that it's August, that it's summer, and it does what it must. I hate summers. The evening heat envelops everything, and all I do is water every night so the hydrangeas don't wilt and the ferns retain their prehistoric green. The geraniums are neutered, and I can already see them scorched by some passing drone that scorches them as it passes by. Yes, I'm afraid, I confess. Darkness invades my soul, tired of informing a body that grows more tired and older every day. I want to counsel myself, thinking that September will soon return, and with it the town will return to its delicious seaside drowsiness, but it's no use. Now reigns the radical darkness of the soul and the terror spread by these two madmen who rule the world.
Soon will be the Virgin of August, the peak of August. The light will begin to slant, and in September she will poke her nose between the rough, perfumed leaves of the fig trees. The Virgin of August, Saint Mary, is the patron saint of many parishes and, therefore, presides over many solemn services and many major festivals. Many memories assail me. The Girona Cathedral, dedicated to Saint Mary, celebrates—or celebrated, I don't know—its main festival. I remember the bursts of the organ, the incense fumeroles, the flowers, the white gladioli, unscented, and the tuberoses, surely overscented. The Gothic stained-glass windows of the apse displayed their colors against the incomparable silver altarpiece. Bishop and canons carried out their scheduled ceremonies beneath the immense vault. There was an air of solemn celebration in that sad and endless postwar period. I remember the Catholic liturgy as a kind of consolation in the midst of the darkness of everyday life. It was a tradition that came from far away and that gave you the assurance of what is lasting. Memories of August.
But memories fade and the current darkness returns, the one that hangs over the world and envelops us with customary terrors. In any case, perhaps a small thought of hope is still possible. Perhaps the two madmen who rule the world will repent before doing irreparable harm. In that poem I was telling you about earlier, Auden says: "I wish I, composed of Eros and dust, / Tormented […] by negation and despair, / Would show an affirmative flame." This is what I would like.
