It goes from left to right, the burgundy drape. Rome, a dead city. No cars, a few helicopters, but mainly quiet, mourning. People walking, people stuck in the outskirts of the city with thoughts of death. Degrees of dying mount. His corpse is passed around, like a prize, like a symbol. He smells of vinegar and bleach. His nose has shrunk and is becoming hawkish. To see him like this, daily, is to see his death over and over. Until he shrivels away. He is a fat Pope the first day he is dead—large and full as a turkey, round and well-fed. His stomach spills out of the casket. The next day he is smaller, his drapes looser, his stomach firm. And now he is just gone.
Days go by and more come crying and mourning, more bells ringing, sour tears, and magnified voices praying over loudspeakers all through Rome. In train stations, airports and villages. Young Polish women, poor Polish women, old Polish women, blonde hair, blue eyes, the kind Italians love, and boy scouts everywhere, with their shorts and wool socks and badges. A city inundated by thoughts of Poland, the Pope’s youth, his will, his desire for peace. Anything to make him a saint.
On the fourth day his body is the thinnest it’s been and he’s still not in the ground. He floats around the city in his casket so people can touch him and kiss him good-bye. Suddenly, he is lost. Some say the men carrying the casket got tired, put the body down and the mourners attacked it, cuddled it in their arms until it faded away, until he was consumed.
It reappears in the gardens of Villa Pamphili above Saint Peter’s. Nobody saw how it got there. The body of the Pope dead, under a tree. In town, the search begins. “It’s been misplaced,” says the media. Theories about the resurrection of the Pope begin: the Pope as the new Christ, the Pope as an eagle who flew away. Meanwhile he is there, under a pine tree, sitting very still. The zucchetto skullcap on his head, his pale, long hands, nails still growing, clutching his robe. He sits in the spring of Rome, in the sun that has made him round again. His nose has puffed up, his lungs have unfolded, his toes stretched out. The body has stopped shriveling. It stays in its place, big and round and full of flab. He notices it, remembers, over and over, the people who stripped him down and saw his indulgences, smelled his dead body and stuffed it with products that made him tangy. The smell was so sharp it caused some mourners to shed tears not from sadness.
Wind blows in the air. It’s almost seven, a little chilly now. Six Cardinals on a beautiful terrace above the Vatican City are asked if it isn’t only natural that such a controversial Pope would end up disappearing.
“Is this part of his duality? Being dead and being gone. Or alive and somewhere else? Do you think the dead Pope is performing a miracle?” a journalist asks.
A Cardinal from New England replies knowingly, “Miracles are to be expected when sainthood is at the door.”
The journalist smiles, “Another beatification trick…”
Laura, the proud wife of the American President, is in the Basilica praying. She examines the church in marvel. Her squinty eyes are covered by a black Armani veil. This morning she asked her husband if the mourning veil was “too much.” As she takes in the beauty of Michelangelo’s touch she thinks, “I am on camera” and looks towards the TV crews like an inconsolable widow. When the security guards barge in with news of the disappearance, her fingers touch the edge of her lips for fifteen consecutive seconds to express shock. The guards search under the Pietà, over in the Sistine Chapel, in the Vatican Museum, all the way up in Saint Peter’s Dome. Nobody remembers the last time they even saw him. Dead or alive.
The journalist keeps questioning Cardinal after Cardinal. She thinks a Spanish Cardinal might be more intuitive than an American one, have more insight about where the Pope might be. Perhaps the Cardinal who guesses where the body of the Pope is automatically becomes the next Pope.
Dogs search the city. They are given samples of formaldehyde, methanol and other embalming chemicals used on the Pope’s body. They rummage, stopping to bark in front of each church. Pilgrims pet them and give them water and bread.
The Pope remains sitting under the pine tree. The terrace behind him overlooks Rome. If he gathers enough strength to get up and take a few steps, he would see the crowds. But something about the sunset and what it does to his body makes it hard to even whisper. He knows where they are, the people. But he just sits, slouching against the trunk of the tree. His chin droops over his chest. The breeze blows. From the city below, the sounds of turmoil as the nation decides whether or not to have a body-less funeral. If the body is not retrieved soon they should, the government officials say. Just like they do for victims of plane crashes and drownings.
In the streets, thousands of multicolored tents crowd each city corner. Lines form in front of public water fountains. Pillows, blankets, hotdogs and souvenirs are passed around. The pilgrims are poor, but they purchase reminders of these important days. White T-shirts with the Pope’s face appear around the city. “Have you seen me?” they say. But not as a joke. The search dogs hunt. Seagulls circle over the Jewish ghetto, shrieking. Another flock hovers over the forum. Up at Villa Pamphili the wind picks up, tilting the Pope’s zucchetto. He doesn’t like to be cold. He can barely lift his hand to put the hat back in place. His head rolls back and his closed eyes turn toward the sky in praise. “Here I am,” he says, as the sun fades behind the horizon. The sky turns metallic gray. His face, illuminated by the last rays, is suddenly, after three days of cold, completely warm. He shifts slightly in his seat, his stomach flopping to the right. His eyelids get heavier as he feels his body sinking deep down into something cold and smooth. No more light. “A grotto? A marble crypt?” he thinks as a door seals shut above his head.
