Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Piazza Michaelangelo at Sunset

The sun begins to set to the applause of distant churchbells ringing, calling the devout to worship and the watchless to dinner. The city below is praised in languages foreign to me but not the view. German, Japanese, Italian, and yet they must speak the same words that have been spoken for ages. The final dip behind the Tuscan hills sends the sunlight pink and flaming to the bottom of the clouds reaching through to the grey outer limits. A jet splits the city sky in two.

Lovers, old and young, holding hands, arms around one another, touching. Renewing themselves with a view most complete. The birds have now begun to sing their evening song from trees nearby.

I try not to look back at the parking lot, although even that has a certain beauty in this light. O what an illustrious city! Centuries upon centuries of work, defining work, held within its broken walls. Gates calling out to weary travellers of old.

The cool night breeze has picked up as the lights of Fiesole begin to dot the far hillside. But the chill refreshes, reminds me only of comforts later to be afforded. To my left is a perfect little valley replete with vineyards, olive groves, villas and blossoms. Straight ahead the remains of today’s sunlight with a church's duomo and the Arno flowing under Ponte Vecchio. The tower in Piazza della Signoria stands proud against the background smoked grey hills.

Civic to Spiritual my eye swings as Chiesa de Maria de Fiore fills the view of the citied skyline. Brunelleschi’s grand Duomo standing out like the Queen of the Valley. The jet’s stream is pure pink against a fading blue sky.

A natural line up from the buildinged street-like fields to the Duomo to the heavens and back to the piazzalle in time to watch a beautiful redhead walk up the stairs. O Beauty absorbing.

Darkness is now descending to alleviate the overwhelming sense of grandeur. And yet Santa Croce stands to my right with a silent (and not visible from here) Dante and I watching over it. Magnificent the accomplishments, human accomplishments that were realized in this city.

The old waiter removes the settings from his patio tables that overlook the city. His trade, with the Sun, are gone till tomorrow.

I look around in the fading light to see a radiance, similar, in all the faces. An inherent glory of sorts. The wind has now chilled me to the point of departure. And the feeling I get as I prepare to leave is that the people up here and the city are now as one: lit up as a reward for being here.

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