I tried. I was constantly trying to stay calm. I did everything they told me ...
I looked at the clouds that ran in the sky ... I was listening to the leaves of the trees when the wind passes through them, which throws my hair and tunic into the air even if I don't want to ... With my fingers I kept track of the animals I met, sheep, pigs, dogs, cats, chickens, rabbits, but then the fingers ran out and I couldn't go on.
But a slightly crooked look from someone was enough, or an annoying noise, or some stupid of my neighbors who came up with a sentence as if she had written the Gospel, she who could not even read ... and I was angry. A black fury ...
I went like a bull, or a beak, with my head down. I charged, shouted, and kicked, scratched whoever wanted to stop me, my eyes rolling, which seemed to come out of their sockets, and I spat, like mad, in a hoarse voice of hell full of devils. And I got a kind of thick salivation on my lips, like the washing foam. My heart wanted to escape from my chest, and I ran, I tripped over stones, I fell, and there was blood, and earth, and mud, and shit, on those filthy streets ... I threw it at those around me, but I wanted to to blow up the world, like the bellies of cows that eat fresh alfalfa….
A friar, I think ... I don't like cassocks and they don't like me ... every now and then he would take me by the hair and throw my head into the water, I don't know if he is holy or not: I felt suffocated and I knew I would die , also because he held me under until my breath stopped… When he pulled me out I breathed all the air there was and he would say to me with a hiss: “Are you finished, you filthy being that you live in this body?”. I didn't speak, but I coughed and shivered at the thought that he would send me back again ...
Then someone said I needed an exorcist. I couldn't explain what was happening to me, but it was like a fire inside.
I had never seen him: he was not someone who went around a lot. He prayed in his own hole, far from everything. He had none of the exorcists, no holy water, no crucifix or pins or chains. They called him Martino.
I was screaming like a possessed, in one of my furious fits. He pushed everyone away and came close to me, looking at me. I saw one of my spit trickle down his cheek. He took my hands and without hurting me, he pulled me towards him and… he hugged me, strong, close to him. He was talking in my ear, so I stopped screaming because I couldn't hear. I just felt my heart going like a madman away from me, crashing into his chest and coming back… And so it all slowed down… Finally. I could feel her heart beating along with mine. Or was it mine following hers ... Now I understood her words in my ear ...
“Sister, I love you, I am your brother… Breathe and throw away your anxieties and your anger. Love to be loved in return. Open your arms to welcome. We are all brothers, let's never forget ... "
I was fine. Tears flowed from my eyes, but I was fine. With infinite sweetness he detached me from himself and looked at me to the end, into the dark bottom of the well of the eyes.
No one had ever given me such a speech, without words.