~Confessions of a Modern Rosicrucian - The Italian Connection Canto VI. Dante’s Inferno – Healing the sins of the father – in Montefegatesi - to reclaim my Rosicrucian current with the ‘Freethinkers Movement’ A true story of then…
I am 19, a feral know-it-all, wearing rusty safety-pins & combat boots - my head shaved up the left side, from my temple to my flaming-red, cocks-crow crown. With Owen Barfield’s novel, ‘Unancestral Voice’ in hand, I take a semester away from studying Philosophy & Comparative Religion at San Francisco State University. DHL flys me across the pond for free, in exchange for using my baggage allowance. London punks are on the rage - the ‘Iron Curtain-Wall of Shame’ still casting an ominous shadow – The ‘Red Brigades’ are burning cars on the streets of Rome during those ‘Years of Lead’.
The bus runs once a week up the dogleg curves of the mountain, where my father’s people, the Lucchesi, have roots in the liver-colored clay of Montefegatesi - the highest village in the Tuscany province of Bagni di Lucca, Italy, known for its centuries-old thermal baths. It was arranged that I could stay with some distant relatives. I don’t even remember their names. They spoke no English – I spoke no Italian. Having grown up with the Italian side in the burbs of Chicago, I was used to Sunday meals & family gatherings with animated conversations round a table laden with festive foods. Bone-thin hungry, I am imagining delectable 5-course-meals of ‘authentic’ Italian cuisine - But no, they are poor, old, & humble - Living in a dusky century-old stone-house clinging to the side of a crag. I am shown to a room with no windows, where giant wheels of cheese rest & age – Prized rounds of accasciato on cardboard with waxy crumbs are rolled off an extra-high single bed where I sleep. Meals consist of thick-crusted bread, & that cheese - locally made from the goats raised on the hillside - & rich dark wine from the vineyards growing on the tiers cut into the cliff. There is no space for a garden - Maybe they trade with neighbors for veggies in season - But it was late February, & perhaps the root cellar was empty? The cold was cut with a flush of Spring, curled in the mists - The seasonal shift actively pushing Winters boundaries. We sit together at table, dawn & dusk, nodding & chewing - smiling & gesturing our good will. They are old & not well. I pack my staple-hunk-lunch in a napkin & set out for the day. I have 2 destinations: The trek to the top of the mountain to visit the monument to Dante Alighieri - & the steep scramble down the rockface to the shine of the Madonna in a Chapel cave. In Paradiso with Dante & I listen with the clouds - communing with the Sylphs - structuring the water-drops with the Undines – I drink in the sweeping views – singing & pacing the 4 quarters - I write poems & spiritual propaganda, while the Sun plays teeter-totter with the mist & the panorama vistas - the waning Moon a transparent mirage by high noon. Down below, stepping into the shadow across the proscenium of the grotto – the wet echo of my boots startle an awakening awareness - announcing a modern humanness into the Underworld reverence of the cave – Agitating the Earth Elementals plying quartz in the dark – a foreign dissonance to the ancient melody in the devote sentiment - whose rhythmic hammering - matches the clicking crystal of the hanging Rosary in hands of the Widow – several cowled heads bowed in worship to the Madonna. Yes, the Widows rule the mountain village – dressed in tall-collar blacks, they turn to look at me, their clouded all-seeing eye, & Witch-white hair - Gummy smiles & wagging shushing fingers. Still, I sit, amongst them - inviting their whispered rote, & the flickering candles ever blackening the gnarly juts near the nave, to lift me into trance. The next night I am invited to the home of the only young couple in the village – they speak a bit of English - they proudly show me their black & white t.v. - the only one in the village – but the big attraction is their 3-month-old baby – the one & only child on the mountain - who they struggle to sequester from the over-fawning Nona’s, to no avail. As the infant is passed around to receive kisses worthy of the sweet baby Jesus, the couple try to translate. Around every ‘Allora’, come tales about the history of Montefegatesi –it is agreed that First off I should hear about how Emperor Frederick II granted the mountain village to the Lucchesi in return for their loyalty, exempting them from certain taxes.
And the other favorite story is how Dante passed thru Montefegatesi to escape Florentine assassins - & while he was crossing the Orrido di Botri, a deep canyon ravine, surrounding the village, he got his inspiration for the ‘Inferno’. One of the Widows interrupted saying that the statue of Dante on the peak, & the one of Garibaldi in the piazza, were conjured thru the prayers & intersession of my Grandmother! – There were more stories about her than about my opera singing Grandfather who grew up in the village, bringing his bossy Strega Wife, who was part of a Masonic Order called the ‘Freethinkers Movement’. They said she often quoted Aristotle, & was crazy for Garibaldi. Some laughed, others shook their heads, or crossed themselves while telling tales out of turn of her exploits & sharp tongue. The next evening, after my days excursion, I was stopped in the little piazza by the 2 Crone sisters who lived with their retarded hunchback nephew next door. (I’m not making this up!) Somehow, I was able to understand that the baby had gotten sick. When I went into the house, they were all crying & lamenting – wailing – one hand hitting their chest or pulling at hair - the other gripping the Rosary – as they roiled in their chairs or on arthritic knee. One of the old men bared me at the door & told me in broken English that I had to leave – that I had brought the Lucchesi curse back on them – something to do with my Strega Nona Grandmother..? The hunchback was told to take me around to see if anyone would house me for the night. It was like a Mel Brooks or Monty Python movie, except sad & embarrasing – We shuffled along the dark narrow passageways - the nephew knocking on doors - which either remained bolted, or undone a crack to reveal fearful faces, & then slammed shut. Finally he shrugged, & limped away.
I went up to Dante but it was too cold & windy, so I snuck back in the house - took a blanket - & found a spot to nestle on the side of the hill by one of the grapevine tiers. I awoke to the sound of bells knocking on the throats of the goats loaming over me. Luckily that was the day the bus was scheduled to make its run. At the start of the trip, I had arranged for a friend from San Franscico to come up on that bus, he was supposed to stay & experience the warm welcome of my Italian Family, & my fantasy of those 5-course meals. Instead, we received the malocchio glare thru shuttered windows – so we just sat in the bus - the driver shook his head & made the sign of the cross - & off we went - away – down the mountain - passing the ravine of Dante’s inferno along the way. Allora – that was 45 years ago – In the next Canto I dare to return! ~ hag
6 – 9 pm Saturday 8 November 2025 – Save the Date ‘cause this is our last big bonfire-prep-stir-pot-luck-communal gathering at the Lucchesi-Archer-Ginsberg homestead!We sold our house - & we’re moving to WI – around the corner from Zinniker Farm!RSVP Hazel@CogRite.com
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Greetings Friend, you currently a free subscriber to Cognitive Ritual. Thank you for receiving my workings freely offered. For the full experience, upgrade your subscription. ALL donations go to support Zinniker Farm - The oldest Biodynamic Farm in America! Together we can spiritualize the Universe. XOX ~hag
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Thursday, 16 October 2025
The ‘Freethinkers Movement’
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