Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Quando Amore!?" (Song)

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Quando Amore!?" (Song)


Quando amore, me-dahlin'?
Quando amore tonight?
(Ah-ah-ah!)
Quando amore, I love U,
quando amore this night?

Kiss me, me-dahlin'
I love U;
(Ah-ah-ah!)
Kiss me in heaven above;
quando, quando, oh quando,
when will U be my love?

(sotto voce:)
Quando amore, me-dahlin'?
Quando amore my dear?
Quando amore, it's Wednesday!
Lend me some money, my dear?

(back to normal voce:)
Kiss me, kiss me, domani?
Make all your kisses so sweet,
(Ah-ah-ah!)
and I will pay back all your money
tomorrow, or maybe next week?

(sotto voce:)
E quando amore, my sweet?
E quando amore, my sweet?
E QUANDO AMORE, MI CARO!...?


c 2014/davedelacroix/lord borgo/piacenza-italia.

Our Man in Europedave delacroix/ "A Pot of Good Ale!"

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "A Pot of Good Ale!" (old English song)


The Poor man will praise it, so he has good cause,
that all the year round, eats neither partridge nor quail,
but sets up his rest and makes up his feast
with a crust of brown bread and a pot of good Ale.

And the good old Cleric, whose sight grows too dark,
and ever he thinks the print is too small?
He will see every letter and SAY "service" better
if he glaze but his eyes with a pot of good Ale.

The Poet divine that cannot reach wine
because his money has many times failed?
Will hit on the vein, to make a good strain
if he but inspired with a pot of good Ale!...

(From "An antidote against melancholy", published: 1661, edited by Payne Collier/updated by Dave Delacroix, 2014)

c 2014/nov/davedelacroix/ourmanineurope/piacenza-Italy.

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "BABYLON".

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Babylon."


...Can I get to Babylon by candle-light?
You betcha'! WOT!? -U an idiot?
-Buy a flash-light!

Oliver Twist: "Can I have some MORE?"
"More?"
"More!?"
"MORE!!!?"

No problemo, Oliver. Get an AK-47 and blow the Soup-spooners away; plead hunger-insanity, kid? You'll be out (of jail) in 6 months! Ergo, meantime you EAT, kill da Fascist COP? -NO! Let the Fascists COPS kill each OTHER; just freeze their pay-check : POWER -is RECOGNITION. So be "recognised" and come out swinging!

Can YOU get to Babylon by candle-light? You betcha'! Just GO!.... And how MANY miles to Babylon?
-Three-score and ten.

(Ahah!) Can I get there by candle-light?
Yes. With an AK-47. And back again.



c 2014/davedelacropix/ourmanineurope/rainy november, CREMONA-Italia.

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Antinnuois and the Sea." (part 4)

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Antinnuous and the Sea." (Part 4)


(YIKES! -read part 3 !?) ...Stunned, I had not noticed that I was pouring valuable Scotch Whisky from my over flowing plastic cup all over my upper torso? -Re-acting quickly, I addressed the situation with the palms of my hands then licked my fingers to a sticky solution., ALL THE WHILE - I might add - my eyes riveted on this ENIGMA, this inert Statue, whilst Argonauts (my 12-footer boat thingy-named after a Denver liquor Store)  - drifted out to sea and settled under the daunting canopy of that once distant cumulus cloud...

...The rest is easy. The Argonaut was in serious maritime trouble and its lone mast (Marsupial-penis-thingy) was snapped in half, then the boat - FRICKIN ROGUE WAVE!!! - flipped, Antonnious got his wish, gone to da bottom, man; the boat flipped AGAIN, this time, right side up, I clambered aboard and bailed with empty beer cans like YO Momma! -till it was reasonably afloat? OH! OH! OH! One of my cases of beer (Aluminum cans) I was able to salvage. The bottled Whisky, alas, a present for some beachcomber on a distant shore? The Box-Vino, however, must have dissolved, certainly disappeared,, though I like to think Antonious got the latent prize? And, apparently, it was a "white squall" that over-took the Argonauts; and  buggered off as fast as it arrived! So battered, bruised, me and the 12-footer, the good ol' Argonaut-broken mast an'all, rallied into the crowd-filled harbor with a tale... THIS Fisherman...could not tell.

(Fini)




c 2014/davedelacroix/ourmanineurope/nov/piacenza-italia.

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Antinnuous and the Sea" (Part 3)

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Antinnuous and the Sea" (Part 3)



(Singing:) "What a friend we've got in Jesus? Jesus is da one for Me. Wot a friend we've got in Jesus? Him and Malt Whiskey!"
God forbid, but I sang it aloud, shaking off the "uglies" inspired by something other than warm, human contact; like unexpectedly coming into contact with Reptile flesh?
OK. On the good ship "Lollipop" (Argonauts) -named after a Liquor store, I "trawl" up an antique statue. It's a Bronze, class-life-size of a hansom naked boy, perfectly limb ed except for teeth indentures across the abdomen and a missing left foot, severed above the ankle.. AIR - I surmise, within the bronze moulding gained through the missing limb had enabled it to "pop-cork!" to the ocean's surface? And it weighed a bloody ton and took me two bloody beers to haul it on board the Argonauts, shackled in my Trawl net.

500 yards from the nearest cliff/point of land, incidentally, I could hear cries and yells of excitement: The Whale-watchers, tourists, local populace with their binoculars, telescopic cameras, etc.

...So  - me and da Bronze dude - we bobbed about a bit, actually, the tide taking us a mile or 2 out to sea; I drinking, Bronze fella  abstaining, which gave me time to consider my unexpected crew-mate, a classical Adonis, Greek or Roman sculpture, with blue opaque eyes, yet in mosaic of crystal, quite life-like, I could only guess? Intended for an ancient deified temple, worth a million bucks?
I threw my brewski over the side! For THIS? -I needed a Scotch... THEN SUDDENLY, the statues eyes kinda metallic-blinked and mosaic-crystal removed, became alive! Now they were consonant. They were red-black! Simultaneously, a mouth, thin-lipped, cracked open from the bronze, nubile youth's mask of a face, an exhalation of extreme gravity that assumed an old man's bacon-cracklin' hoarse tone:

"...I was once Antonnious. I was murdered by the
Emperor, not with a command but with a sigh.
We were sailing up the Nile; their was no malice.
The Emperor's courtiers ensured it so. I couldn't
swim. The crocodiles! My soul despaired and thus flowed
into this sea; love lost, guilt and shame. Neptune, perhaps,
saved my Soul with his Trident? IN ESSE, with time, I
saw Rome's fall. I saw the destruction. I see it still; over
and over again."

I made to speak;

"Silence!" he commanded, as one who is used to being obeyed:
 "You will let me back down in the waters...and the Gods
 will thank you...that Antinnious sleeps." -initially spoken with an old man's hoarse venom,
 the latter sentiment, ended on a sweet youth's tone.


(Antonnious and the Sea, Part 4, to be continued next Sunday.)



c 2014/davedelacroix/ourmanineurope/piacenza-italia.

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Antinuous and the Sea" (Part 2)

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Antinuous and the Sea." (Part 2)



"It was a dark and stormy night, The Captain said, "Show us a light!" (Cigarette-thingy: ) The 1st. Mate said, "Alright." -as the ship went down."
-one of my father's - two Ports (Vino)  into da wind,  anecdotes.
But I digress?

Still alive on the 12-footer, good ship ARGONAUT (named after the Denver-Colorado Liquor store on East Colfax) - my recreation off South shore Sicily "trawling-thingy" hits a SNAG. My "trawl" net had caught something unwieldy and twixt the flowing (ebb?) tide and its (Da thingy caught in my trawl net) unwieldiness, initially causes a violent tug of war, almost to capsize the boat!
This lasts but, for about minute, something gives,  then I'm back in the Cyclops of the near shore cross-currents, the ones so feared by bathers; the RIP-TIDE.
No-worries. My lone sail worries the tide, the TIDE worries my near-onshore boat: We Argonauts are made of stern stuff especially when the boat - to all intents and purposes -  is a floating Cocktail Bar? And I had sufficiently recovered from the recent "jolt" to recline, relax at the helm, pour myself a fresh brewski and observe a large group of "Whale-Watchers" atop a nearby cliff with Cameras, Binoculars, Telescopes, and - could perceive -  that every Female within  that grouping had been surgically attached/en-joined with a Cell-phone at birth!...which postponed and distracted  my attention to my near oceanic  demise whilst, ah ah! -"Boating." Anyways? The ARGONAUTS ain't goin' no-place?" -I said to myself; "We're in the EYE of the bay?" -I put my Shades back on and reclined under the indolent flapping of my one lone sail and abstractly toyed with the  tiller/rudder-thingy.

Yet "something"  - within or without? - was stirring in my indolence: "Wad I catch with my Trawl? A rock?, a displaced chunk of coral, collided with a great white shark KNOWN to patrol these waters in search of fat, succulent Albacore? And as for my Trawl net ( €50!), it was - presumably? -  History!
(No refunds in Sicily, incidentally)... WHEN SUDDENLY (Tra-la!) This Negro/black-bronze- clenched fist, arm extended above a youth of  curl-frock ed head, literally FOUNTAINS UP from the depths in a hiss of sea spray, bangs against the boat and bobs up and down to the dynamic of the waves!
"DUDE!" -I exclaim, and rush to him as one who will save another from the cruel sea. But the sea jostles him away from the boat, his up stretched arm in some salute, his head and piercing eyes, directly upon me. Yet the sea urges him back to the boat and THIS time I can grasp his hand; a hand, ice cold, and of Bronze metal.


(Antinuous and the Sea, Part 3, next Sunday.)


c 2014/davedelacroix/ourmanineurope/piacenza-Italia.

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Antinious & the Sea". (Part 1.)

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Antinious and the Sea." (Part 1)

(dedicato: Georgie Gold)


...Tiring of Winter in the PO valley, south of Milano-Italy, I had the good fortune to secure a rustics cottage on the South shores of Scilly, by ...................  South of Modea.
Sicilian communities are ALL embracing IF?.....Use ya common sense: Bar owners, fishermen, local
folks who  chanel food produce to your Cucina (kitchen), all are to be respected.
A Boatswain who I had regularly encountered at Cafe ............. responded to my request: "Can U rent or sell me a small sail boat for "fishing", etc.? -"I'm an Englishman and the Sea is in my blood...?"
A 12 footer was found. A blanket of sail. 3 foot rudder, stern seating, almost  water-tight, single 10 foot mast-erect like an agitated Marsupial's penis! Consummation with my Sea-faring ancestors was assured (€300).

...Mediterranean Sea Winter's, incidentally, can be atrociously, "OH FRICK! ROGUE WAVE!!!", but once in a while they "becalm" in a fog, mist or frigid chill. OH! OH! OH! I named my boat "ARGONAUTS" after a Liquor store in Denver, Colorado and - suitably? -  always set off on my marine flurries with a full Cooler/ice box of "brewskies" and Box-vino: Drink da "brews", catch some fish for supper, put da suckers in the-then empty beer cooler-thingy. And I NEVER sailed out of sight  of land and this weekend/week-day pastime became a pleasurable tri-weekly  routine.

The "locals" (fishermen) weren't affronted or fiscally intimidated  by my daytime marine pre-ambles? They mostly fished under the MOON for Squid; commercial catch, far out at sea. A whole fleet! Where-as I, after an afternoon's  hour of  "bobbin' up and down, slugging brewskies would sail around the indigo beach bay, bag a couple of "minnows", show off my meagre catch to the SALTY PROS then talk about da  - BIG THANG!!! -  da one  dat got away!

...And then one night, at the Cafe .......... a local PRO-fishin' buddy told me about "Bottom-feeders" -with whom - to MY mind - I had had some experience of  in Hollywood, California and doubted their edibility?
PRO-fish Amico sez: "Bello! Mangari, Davida!" -"M'bara!" He says: ("M'bara" is Sicilian for "Fratello"); "M'bara?" he says: (I translate:) " DON'T fish. TRAWL!. By the shoals, on the sandy sea bed with the Oysters, they thrive!... Skate, Flounder; Il Grande Super-mercato!"

So he sold me a Trawl net (€50),  and the next clear weather day I weighted it down with stones (technically, it wasn't perfect), set sail - "con whiskies/case of beer/box vino  cooler-chest", cruised about a mile offshore, figured I was in a good spot, chucked the whole god-damn Trawl net-rope thingy over the side -only just managing to catch the rapidly disappearing tow line and secure it without spilling my can of beer!

It was a weird day. The sea was quite Pacific. In advent of a glorious sunset, the  cumulus cloud on the horizon could have been Mount ETNA; a chain smoker, like me.... So, I'm dragging/trawling along, singing Sea-Shanties (all concerned with some Wanton in Swansea) when the boat (the Argonaut?) kind'a "stilts?" bow up on end? -struck, like I'd just dropped a major-league anchor off my stern?...And an odd-ball swirling, double-helix mist enveloped my boat!
...I had to take off my Shades...!



(Antinuous & the Sea, Part 2, to be continued, next Sunday.)



c 2014/dave delacroix/ourmanineurope/ piacenza-Italia.