The Nude Swim

On the southwest side of Capri we found a little unknown grotto where no people were and we entered it completely and let our bodies lose all their loneliness. All the fish in us had escaped for a minute. The real fish did not mind. We did not disturb their personal life. We calmly trailed over them and under them, shedding air bubbles, little white balloons that drifted up into the sun by the boat where the Italian boatman slept with his hat over his face. Water so clear you could read a book through it. Water so buoyant you could float on your elbow. I lay on it as on a divan. I lay on it just like Matisse's Red Odalisque. Water was my strange flower, one must picture a woman without a toga or a scarf on a couch as deep as a tomb. The walls of that grotto were everycolor blue and you said, 'Look! Your eyes are seacolor. Look! Your eyes are skycolor.' And my eyes shut down as if they were suddenly ashamed.