Unrestrained beauty, overflowing dumpsters

I love Rome. I love the way the sunset throws pink light on the marble monuments. I savor the silky carbonara at Da Cesare al Casaletto. I enjoy the exhibits at the MAXXI contemporary art museum, the murmurations of starlings moving like smoke above the umbrella pines. I get a kick out of my kids calling their tennis instructor “maestro,” and miss the cold not one bit. I’ve spent a decent chunk of my life here, met my wife here, support A.S. Roma soccer here. And so Rome, I only say this because I love you.

Rome is in danger of becoming a dump. I don’t mean the rubbish heap of history, which is how the poet Petrarch envisioned the city in the 14th century. I don’t mean a precious junkyard of alfresco antiquities, Renaissance gems and Baroque treasures. I mean a dump.

The laurels upon which the city has rested for so long are wilting. Rome now overwhelms the senses, not just with unrestrained beauty, but with overflowing dumpsters, like rancid coral reefs sprouting pink and blue and yellow garbage bags on seemingly every city street. Seagulls, protecting their trashy turf, caw in the air, and public buses — which often break down, sometimes explode, but rarely arrive on time — screech on the ground. Potholes rupture spinal discs. Dimly lighted streets force drivers to develop night vision. Uncurbed dogs render sidewalks treacherous. My son calls Rome “poop city.”

None of this is a secret. Il Messaggero, the Roman daily, may as well be called the Garbage Gazette, dedicating itself to documenting the city’s decline. (“No Heat in the Schools;” “Few and Broken Benches: Everyone Standing in the Park.”)

Escalators in the metro remained out of service for weeks after an October accident nearly amputated the feet of Russian tourists. This month, some central stations failed to open at all and a member of Parliament proposed bringing in the army to fill the potholes. In the meantime, fences in the streets guard sinkholes or workers perennially digging to fix leaking pipes, pushing motorists into oncoming traffic. The public villas, Rome’s green lungs, have become post-apocalyptic landscapes where vagabonds sleep on slides and yellow Roma Capitale tape sections off fallen trees like crime scenes. Vermin slink through the hip-high weeds in the land where wild boars now roam.