INTUARSI

Dante and the forgotten gesture of human relationship

“S’io m’intuassi, come tu t’inmii.”

In the Paradiso, Dante uses an almost unknown word.

A word that feels nearly impossible.

Intuarsi.

To enter another person without invading them.
To feel another without losing oneself.
To inhabit, even for a single instant, their inner world.

Not fusion.

Not possession.

Mutual presence.

From two… becoming a “we”.

In a time that seems to know almost only the “I”, this word feels as if it came from another civilization.

A civilization in which knowing meant participation.
And loving meant entering truly into relationship.

Perhaps this is what is most deeply missing today.

Not communicating more.

But intuarsi.

Dante preserves other words like this as well.

Inforsarsi.
To dwell inside doubt.

Insemprarsi.
To enter eternity.

Incielarsi.
To become one with the sky.

These are not decorative words.

They are experiences.

For Dante, to understand something did not mean observing it from afar.

It meant entering into it.

With the whole body.
With the whole mind.
With the whole heart.

Perhaps this is precisely what we have forgotten.

To feel deeply.

To remain close enough to be touched by another person’s existence.

In a fast, distracted and often superficial age, intuarsi reminds us that human relationship is not born from distance.

It is born from presence.

From listening.

From the capacity to make space within oneself for the existence of another.

And perhaps, for a brief moment, to become together something greater than the simple “I”.

Follemente Insieme Journal