Well ... I don't understand anything about these Lords who govern us ... And the Emperor ... and the Bishop ... and the rich ... They always want something from us poor people! And here a movement began, who goes, who comes, they build a church, they tear down some walls… Too many people for my taste: I don't know where we will end up!
Luckily I am a fisherman and I go off with my little boat, there, after the Island ... we call ourselves "the Gallinaria" because there is full of chickens, that one day you are hungry and you do not know what to eat to your children, you go there and pull your neck in two or three, be careful not to let yourself be seen too much ... and beautiful what a done!
I'm fine in the middle of the water. And that's okay, sometimes there is a bit of a rough sea that returns you to what you ate, but since I eat little because there is not so much and I have a few children, basically me nothing comes back ... When I am there, I have thrown the net and I wait ... there is a silence ... there is calm ... you do not seem to be in the world ... Other than those priests who trombonate from up there and threaten us, because " If you do this and that God sees you and punishes you! ”. There, in the midst of that silence, you only hear the waves against the boat and the cries of the seagulls, ... there at times I seem to have understood who God is ... If my wife hears me she tells me to stop, they take me for heretic, and starts saying rosaries ...
That day I was on the beach to mend the broken net, which some lajerti had broken through, and I see myself arriving these two ... Well ... two monks, it seemed to me, who had those cloaks also a little dirty when walking a lot ... They were tired, you could see ... One was a little younger, but the other had a ... good face. Of someone who minds his own business, but if you want to tell him about yours, he listens to you and helps you if he can ...
The young man says: "Sorry, good man ..." that I was about to turn to see who was mad at. Luckily the other comes close to me, puts a hand on my shoulder, which seemed to me to be in my grandmother's arms as a child, and says to me: "Brother" ... and I didn't even want to say "brother to whom?" " because it was like he was really my brother ... What a strange guy!
In short, he wanted to go to the island and asked me if I would take him there. "Now?!" I told us… “If you can” he replied. We looked each other in the face, well in the eyes, and no one lowered them. I felt like I had known him all my life, which had never happened to me. I told us that I am Bartolo. Him, Martino. And he says to me: "I have no money and I cannot pay you" ... I told us that I would have sworn it, but that in this pig world it is not that you only do something for money, and sometimes you help each other, among brothers, like he said. It made me tenderness.
So I let go of the net and loaded them up, but first I got help to push the boat into the water… And we set off. We talked a bit and I told us about my wretched life, that I don't always have to feed my children, but I gave them to the world and I have to think about it ... and with a cheek I asked them if they came from far away ... Eh, from Mediolanum, that I don't even know where he is, and he told me that he is in the plain up north, after the hills, and that he wanted to find a place to be quiet, in solitude, to reflect and find himself ... I I told him that it is enough to stay on a boat in the middle of the sea for a while and wait for God to let us in some fish! And he laughed, a good laugh, and told me that the Island would be his boat in the middle of the sea.
So when we arrived, and the young man pointed me to a cave, I said that it is exposed to the sea and when the storm comes, it comes, it is unlivable. If they gave me this in mind ... I took them further down, where there is a natural harbor and you get there by boat, and there is a small cave inside which has a small source of water to drink. Because, I told you, on the Island if you do not have water you will not survive: you can eat the chickens, which is full, and they also give the name to the Island (which I had already told you, but he didn't know), but if you don't have water ... And even if he gave me the idea that he wasn't so interested in eating and drinking, he thanked me and said to that other: "" We'll stay where Bartolo advises ".
I accompanied them inside, to be sure they understood, and since I'm used to it, I collected sticks for them if they wanted to make a little fire. I also pulled the neck of a hen: they didn't seem so expert to me. Then I went to say hello and that Martino took my hands and thanked me as if I were the Crucifix. I didn't know where to look, but then I looked him in the face, straight in the eye. "Bartolo, God bless you and help you as you did with us, brother", and he hugged me tightly.
I haven't told anyone. But that Martino was a really good person.