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the consequences of war (1638) {60}
the sweltering florentine air did not move to the beat of human torrents oozing down streets of yellowed stone the color of skin rotting after deaths found in a still stagnant river. it hung, stifling over the city where so much had been raised—
under that same sun burning halos through the medici gardens, under those same brilliant skies sizzling from horizon to horizon, twisting their reflections in the whiffs of her blue candy-floss hair brushing against all that antiquity
look how she walks past the withered incarnations of history, carving gashes leaking golden through shifting masses of modernity's sin bleeding past her hallowed fingers into a dead oblivion of the devouring hereafter
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Peter found a way to live for art, too.
He breathed in the Venitian air and it smelled like golden saints reigning above lavish altars and curved domes. It settled in his lungs like a layer of history's dust in the very country that gave birth to classicism.
And that country, it was his muse.
There, on the streets of Florence with its yellow stone and fountains found at uncertain crossroads, he found romance in sublime dreams of beauty.
"Peter."
Surrounded by the glory of a dead empire with its heart beating still, he found himself amidst the great masters. Amidst the sheer poeticism of what they did with paint plastered to their fingers and rushed breaths found between brushstrokes.
"Peter."
"What?" he asked, mind reeling as he took in the forum romano for the last time, spreading before him like a footprint left behind by a god.
"What are you going to do now?" asked Michele, shielding his eyes from the sun as he squinted at the high heavens, silky black hair falling onto his shoulders in soft cascades.
"I'm going to find myself, Merigi."
Michele scoffed, dropping his hands to his sides, casting his dark, daring gaze around the plaza like he had raised it from ruins and painted its every inhale for all the beckoning world to see.
"You've already done that, amicus meus. That's what Italy does to a man—gives birth to the painter inside of him," he placed a finger over Peter's heart, stepping closer, drawing in like a calamity of shadowed eyes and elbows touching, brushes kissing canvases. "Makes you the master."
"You know who Peter Rubens is."
"Now go make the world know him, too."
a/n:
please let me know what you think of this so far! is it too weird or too different? do you like the layout of the story? the portrayal of rubens?
the other painter in this scene is caravaggio (michele angelo merigi da caravaggio), who rubens met when he traveled around italy under the sponsorship of duke gonzaga
