It was September 19, 2020, I was at work and, while I was painting the stairs of a house, I was attracted by a loud noise and I looked out of the window on the courtyard below. A gentleman and a lady, already advanced in age, were picking pomegranates directly from the tree. I ditched my brushes and ran outside, taking photos with my phone. The gentleman, perched on the ladder with scissors and protective goggles, cut the pomegranates from the tree and threw them underneath, where her mother held her apron open like a basket. The throwing of the fruits was so fast that they fell and hit the woman’s arms, heedless of her bruises.

Once the apron was filled, the woman emptied it into a red box, taking care to carefully clean the pomegranates one at a time. Her son, impatient by the wait, called her to her order, inviting her to return to the foot of the tree, and she promptly, with a lightning-fast and energetic jerk, reached her position in a nice beat and beat. Amused by the comedy mixed with tenderness of this exchange between mother and child, I inevitably wondered how many times they had repeated this game and a smile lit up my heart.

Francesco Mercadante