In Esmeralda, city of water, a network of canals and
a network of streets span and intersect each other. To
go from one place to another you have always the
choice between land and boat: and since the shortest
distance between two points in Esmeralda is not a
straight line but a zigzag
that ramifies in tortuous
optional routes, the ways that open to each passerby
are never two, but many, and they increase further
for those who alternate a stretch by boat with one on
dry land.
And so Esmeralda's inhabitants are spared the
boredom of following the same streets every day.
And that is not all: the network of routes is not arranged
on one level, but follows instead an up-and-down
course of steps
, landings, cambered bridges
,
hanging streets. Combining segments of the various
routes, elevated or on ground level, each inhabitant
can enjoy every day the pleasure of a new itinerary to
reach the same places. The most fixed and calm lives
in Esmeralda are spent without any repetition.
Secret and adventurous lives, here as elsewhere,
are subject to greater restrictions. Esmeralda's cats,
thieves, illicit lovers move along higher, discontinuous
ways, dropping from a rooftop to a balcony,
following gurrerings with acrobats' steps. Below, the
rats run in the darkness of the sewers, one behind the
other's tail, along with conspirators and smugglers: they peep out of manholes and drainpipes, they slip
through double bottoms and ditches, from one hiding
place to another they drag crusts of cheese, contraband
goods, kegs of gunpowder, crossing the
city's compactness pierced by the spokes of underground
passages.
A map of Esmeralda
should include, marked in
different colored inks, all these routes, solid and liquid,
evident and hidden. It is more difficult to fix on
the map the routes of the swallows, who cut the air
over the roofs, dropping long invisible parabolas
with their still wings, darting to gulp a mosquito,
spiraling upward, grazing a pinnacle, dominating
from every point of their airy paths all the points of
the city.