Naples and Death

It felt strange, today, visiting two doomed cities. One whose doom came many years ago, on a dark day in August, and another that grows ever larger, seemingly oblivious of the inevitable cataclysm that lurks under the slopes of sleeping Vesuvius. One day, not that far distant, that sleeping giant will awaken and the ash-cloaked death that came to Pompei nine days before the caldendes of September, 833 years after the founding of Rome, will surprise the millions now living in and around Naples.

Walking through the hauntingly intact streets of Pompei this morning, nearly two thousand years after dark Vesuvius' sudden visit, I fancied I could hear the distant echos of the long-dead voices that once filled the streets, market stalls, temples and villas of this once-proud city. Words of commerce and denarii, murmurs of tenderness, jealousy and dark secrets, cries of pleasure, pain and fear. How many mad ignored the warning signs coming from the grumbling giant above them, the shuddering earth and the dark clouds rising around its summit? How many had waited one hour too long, until the black rain came to cover them in its deadly embrace?

Perhaps it is simply morbid curiosity that compels me to dream about the last days of this doomed city. Or is it a breathless augury, one last lingering whispered warning from forgotten gods that the giant Vesuvius slumbers less deeply than many may hope.