Tomato Rhapsody: A Fable of Love, Lust and Forbidden Fruit - By Adam Schell Page 0,20

so covet.

Drained of shadow, a new light was cast upon Cosimo’s fear. He had not seen his cousin for years, but in contrast to what Cosimo recalled from his youth, his cousin appeared to have not only aged, but veritably rotted. In the light, Cosimo noticed the age-spotted epidermis of his cousin’s hand and how his skin looked thin as paper. How unsightly tributaries of blue veins spidered across his bald head and ashen complexion. How the white of his eyes appeared jaundiced and bloodshot, and how his once piercing blue irises had faded to gray. In the light, Cosimo could see all the joy this hateful man had taken from him.

As Pope Leon reached for his quill, Cosimo observed a tremor in his cousin’s hand. He was unsure whether age or rage had caused the palsy, but he imagined it was both. Methodically, the Pope dipped the quill into the inkwell and then brought his hand to the portion of the paper that would soon turn a mere document into a papal decree. Black ink from the quill tip leached onto the parchment like dye suddenly cast into a pool of clear water as Pope Leon XI began his Holy Roman imprimatur. It was a long, slow signature, and as the Pontiff’s quill formed the curves and angles of his name, Cosimo noticed a slight trickle of blood careen down his cousin’s nostril. Ever so briefly, the droplet paused, trapped in the sharp triangle of cartilage that defined the inner tip of the Pope’s beak; and then, with the final stroke of his quill, the droplet gave way, punctuating Pope Leon’s signature with sanguinity.

Mortified, the Pope set down his quill and ran his longish middle finger across his nostril. It streaked his pale digit with red blood. Incredulous, the Pope turned and glared at Cosimo. It was a look of such venom that Cosimo felt his heart spasm with fear, yet he could not turn away. In the light, Cosimo saw the twitch of his cousin’s brow, the swelling of the veins across his left temple and the rupturing of blood vessels that latticed his eyes. It was the first time Cosimo had seen blood run from someone’s eyes since the arsenic poison ate through the tear ducts of his courtesan. Instantly, Cosimo felt the torment in his heart relent and an overwhelming feeling of sadness sweep through his being. If only I were a farmer, he thought, if only I were a farmer.

Now, in case the reader is wondering what an aristocrat like Cosimo di Pucci de’ Meducci the Third, Grand Duke of Tuscany, has to do with our provincial romance, rest assured: Cosimo the Third serves a purpose. The reader should note that our tale is not a love story, not at all, but a romance, and according to the renowned 14th-century Italian dramatist Pozzo Menzogna, “There’s a significant difference between a love story and a romance.”

In a love story, the obstacle(s) to achieving love lie primarily within the protagonist(s), usually in the form of an overly inflated sense of pride. This excessive conceit puts the lovers at odds with each other, while the characters who surround them mock and rejoice in the foolery and antics of such prideful persons as they desperately try to avoid what everyone knows to be ultimately unavoidable. Hence, the love story is predisposed to comedy.

In a romance, however, the love between the protagonists is never in question—from the moment they first set eyes upon each other they know their hearts have been pierced by Cupid’s arrow, or rung by Il Tuono dell’ Amore, the thunder of love, as Menzogna put it. A romance’s conflict, unlike a love story, stems not from self-created issues of pride, but from the more severe burdens that family and society place upon the lovers. ’Tis why the romance is predisposed to tragedy, for the whittling away of one’s vanity is often a comical affair, but the confronting of deeply held societal and familial prejudices, resentments, laws and traditions is an altogether different and all too often tragic set of challenges. Hence, in a romance, time and place are critical to understanding the familial and societal forces that the lovers must confront and circumvent in order to finally unite.

So, while Cosimo di Pucci de’ Meducci the Third, Grand Duke of Tuscany, may or may not have much to do with our story, the decree he and his cousin Pope Leon XI just signed into law helps establish