Sunday, June 25, Day 4 In Italy - Part A, Vallo di Nera

Some days you just have to divide into small chunks, and this was one of them. After breakfast, we left La Romita and rode to Vallo di Nera, just a short bit from Terni. A friend had posted on Facebook that it was one of Italy's most beautiful little secrets.

It is a charming small town, very little shopping, just a quiet, beautiful little town. The first thing we did, of course, was scout out a place to sit and share and be poets! And we really lucked into a great little place to sit and write (the Muse was with us).

 

Looking for a home. 

Note the 7 dwarfs sitting on the ledge? 

That seems to be a recurring theme in several of the  towns. 

Who knows?

Is there room for us in here?

And here we find a "home"...

note the white plastic chairs to the left. 

A bunch of them were stacked, just waiting for us.

We walked a few streets, then turned into a church plaza and there in front of us were stacks of chairs, just waiting to be sat in. One of our more adventurous poets spoke, in Spanish, to a young girl, asking if it was ok for us to unstack the chairs and sit for a while. She went and got her grandmother (I suppose), who came out, gave us permission to sit a while, then unlocked the church for us. Chiesa Di S. Maria, a 13th century church, had been badly damaged by an earthquake and we couldn't go in, but the old lady opened the doors for us (and others) to take a look. There were frescos on every side of the church. I would have loved to have gone inside, but was grateful for the glimpse.

An Italian grandmother. 

Precious soul, invited us through those doors to see

 the fresco on the back wall, then 

we exited back toward the front of the church as 

she entered and opened the church 

from the inside for us to see into.

Note her socks and shoes and note the large keys in her hands.

The ancient fresco on that back wall.

The Churh of St. Mary, 13th Century 

damaged by earthquake

No entry permitted.

Note the incredible frescos along both walls and over the altar.

The old woman had a great little dog who found her way into several poems (including mine).

Somae, such a lover of life

We dubbed her the truffle snuffling dog. She hung around for a while enjoying the visit. The grandmother was a pretty neat picture, too, in her socks and heavy shoes. She carried the largest old keys I have ever seen.

Our writing assignment for that day was based on James Wright's poem:

Today I Was Happy, So I Made This Poem

As the plump squirrel scampers
across the roof of the corncrib,
the moon suddenly stands up in the darkness,
and I see that it is impossible to die.
Each moment of time is a mountain.
An eagle rejoices in the oak trees of heaven,
crying
This is what I wanted.

We were invited to write a poem with the same title. We all took off to our respective chosen writing spots, then came back together in just a short time to share our poems.

Tonya made such an elegant photo as 

she sat in the sun, writing.

Richard, Cathie and Jodi

Jodi, Sarah, Somae, Donna

Tonya and Nancy. 

It was Nancy's "Italian Spanish" that 

got us permission to sit for a while.

 Today I Was Happy

So I Wrote This Poem

by Sheila Conner

Umbrian wind blows its fresh breeze scent of

homemade bread, red geraniums, cypress trees,

and rosemary.

A small dog’s belly of tits drags the ground

as she seeks out a friendly hand

for a scratch on her low white back.

Birds sing their new song.

The Italian guide 

with her crowd of tourists

adds to the music of the moment.

Chiesa di Santa Maria,

shares her presence with us.

All of it

is at home in me.

After writing, we spent some time simply strolling through the small town, then made our way back to the bus.

We met back at a little "cafe" to get something cold to drink while we waited for the bus to take us to our next stop, Scheggino. Time for a picnic lunch!

Tonya and Jodi