Olga Rudge & Ezra Pound: "What Thou Lovest Well..."

57 A Marriage That Didn’t Happen
years later that the child was not a mistake, ‘‘be it noted that [I] never
contemplated abortion—ever.’’
Toward the end of February 1925, Ezra joined Olga in Rome. Etta
Glover, who lent the apartment, was ‘‘what would have been called a
broad-minded woman’’ (Ezra’s words), given the mores of the time. ‘‘Is
my nail brush under the bed? If so, preserve for future ref[erence].’’ Olga
wrote after the visit, ‘‘mi hai lasciato molto felice [you’ve left me very
happy] . . . she feels that she can go on.’’ Her letter reveals a clear
understanding of their relationship: ‘‘There was no concert today, so I
went to the zoo. You will be pleased to hear that the leopardo has succeeded
in getting the separate cage, which must have been what he
wanted, as he is now quite calm, +/–, before feeding time. . . . his Mrs. is
next door, with the door between open, but he leaves her alone, just
wanders in occasionally to show that he has a right there, too.’’ Pound
described this visit to the Roman zoo in Canto 84: ‘‘and the he leopard lay
on his back, playing with straw / in sheer boredom.’’
Olga was hoping to find a quiet place in ‘‘Régions des Lacs’’ to avoid the
Roman heat—Salò, Gardone, or Sirmione—for her confinement. She left
Rome sometime before March 11, stopping first at the Hotel Metropole at
Lago di Garda, where there were ‘‘lots of ugly old crocks . . . but she likes
it.’’ On the twentieth, she moved on to the Albergo della Pace in Sirmione.
‘‘Sirmione [is the] ideal place—only I take it they wouldn’t allow such a
thing [the birth] in a hotel, especially by an unaccompanied female. [I] will
inquire for any casa di saluti in or near. . . . All she wants is a decent cage
with straw to bury in—and quaio to anyone who comes and looks through
the bars.’’
She sent a brochure of the ‘‘Sanitorio Civico—Stabilimento di Cura’’ of
Dottore de Guggenberg in her next letter: ‘‘I rather think this would
do. . . . I could go about April and stop first at the Elefante Hotel . . .
1555 . . . I like that.’’ The venerable Albergo Elefante—so named in
homage to Hannibal’s crossing of the Alps near the Brenner Pass—was at
Bressanone (Brixen), a small town of twelfth-century cloisters celebrated
by the troubadours.
Olga had just heard that her favorite uncle, Harold Baynes, had
succumbed to stomach cancer at Bailey Island, Maine. ‘‘She’s unhappy