Ancora Italia, eviva!

For the first week, deep in the countryside of the Italian Marche, all etherized contact was absolved (nice word choice there!). Outside the crickets blasted away the silence and the heat pressed down. We siesta-ed in the afternoons, after visiting fresco-rich chapels and abbeys. Supper outside on the terrace overlooking the rolling fields, sunflower-gold and greens, and watching the shadows lengthen to culminate in a watercolour sunset, different each day.
The moon waxed to become full on my last night near Urbisaglia. Quiet in my bedroom I watched the night, the fields silvered and the trees now still, no longer wind-tossed as they had been. Shadows curling over the terracotta roof tiles.
Each day seemed long and full and harvesting peace. One day I wrote:

Does this wind howl? Or maybe moan?
Clearly does not whistle...
All else so quiet.
The kestrel glides triumphantly, slides
over unseen banks of air, tips and turns.
In the valley the poplar leaves vibrate.
A pair of white butterflies appear
We rest in the noonday heat.
The moon glides into place
out of her background haze
a faint form against the white-blue
shuddering, inimical sky
We wait for dusk...

We would sit silent, gazing out as the light faded. No words. No music.
Maybe a glass of wine.

 This is actually a view looking from a city wall of Perugia. I need to upload the pix taken in Urbisaglia and Tolentino.