Gleaning the Meaning

I am sitting in an austere classroom, devoid of pictures, color and warmth in a cold, red brick school house at the top of a narrow cobblestone street. There is a high, black iron fence around it with a recess yard in the back, paved over--no greenery, inside or or out. The children can, however, look to the the blue sky and clouds above and feel the breeze as they pay tag unitl the a bell rings out, calling the children in from recess into the dark halls. 

     Then up they go up the creaky wooden steps into rooms where stern nuns stands at the front of the classroom to continue the lessons, which often turn into the topic of sin or and admonishment to or humiliation of one or another of the students or the class as a whole. 

     Yet, there is one shining lesson which rays out—I suppose my first memory of being transported in an instant away from the ordinary. A small book was given out with cream-colored, newsprint pages filled with poetry and reproductions of paintings in sepia tones. This must have been a rare event; maybe happening only that once. Even though the book itself was plain, without color, I remember taking it into my hands with reverence and anticipation. Looking through that book was nourishment for a hungry soul, strength for a growing child, fresh air in the close room, light and warmth in the midst of the cold. Such are the gifts of beauty.

     In this book were paintings and poems: Van Gogh's painting a man with hand over he face, which I somehow recognized as a gesture of sorrow. There was The Gleaners by Millet figures bent over scythes working in a field with was softness in the strength of the workers’ bodies, purpose in their efforts, and a beauty in curvature of those lines. 

These images and the poems awakened something in me. One of the poems was lovely, and I had the first stanza by heart the moment I read it.

     Hope is a thing with feathers
     That perches in the soul
     And sings the tune without the words
     And never stops at all. (Emily Dickinson)

These images and words were speaking to me from a place I could enter and through them transporting away fdeadening to the spirit environment--inside and out . 

     I found then, and since then, that the arts are rain and sun surrounding and penetrating the shell that threatens to form around the seed of soul…a seed that is meant to sprout, leaf, bud and bloom. It seems that so much in life would have the shell harden and become impenetrable. That potential blossoming, however, becomes more probable and possible through natural beauty and through the arts and literature, which are expressions of  of what we see, experience, intuit, remember, anticipate, aspire to, and all that can be felt imagined and dreamed--filling the world with all forms and color, with movement, light, music introducing us to gleaning the meaning of human experience, collectively and individually. 

HOW DO I LOVE THEE?

     Dante sees Beatrice for the first time

         How do I love thee, Florence?  Let me count the ways.

Reminiscing about a long-ago stay in Florence, Italy, I experience the memories as gifts to open at any moment--treasures filling my heart, mind and senses with impressions of that "Jewel of the Renaissance."
Many years ago, my husband Robert and I went to live in Florence for one year. As often happens, things did not go as we had planned, and we left discouraged after only a few months. Our money was running out. I could not find a source of income to sustain our stay, and Robert's plan to work with another artist fell through. When I look back, however, it is not the failed plan I remember. it is the 'Being" of Florence I love, and the infinite impressions that remain with me.
    As young people, just married a little over a year, we had our lives ahead of us and sold or stored whatever we had in our little apartment and left for Italy. We found a small, but lovely place with a little fireplace on via di San Giuseppe, across from a side entrance to the Basilica of Santa Croce, with its green and white checkered limestone facade. From our window, we had a view of the statue of Dante Alighieri. How tragic it must have been for him to be exiled, but now he stands watch in the busy sunlit piazza, reclaimed by his beloved city.
    When we first entered the church, I was in awe of the exquisite architecture and embellishments—the columns, statuary, stenciling, gold leaf, paintings, sculptures, and the ornate marble tombs of Michelangelo, Galileo and Machiavelli, the three masters of art, astronomy and politics. Exploration of the art and history associated with this one Florentine basilica alone could occuply a lifetime.
    Florence is a feast for the senses: aromas of espresso; roasting delicasies in wood-fired ovens; displays of dreamy, creamy pastries; la lingua italiana heard from passersby and in open markets; the reverberating church bells all over the city at the canonical hours. There is a special kind of light in Florence too—a golden shower falling on red tile roofs, filtering down to on ancient stone and marble, and above the city the azure hills of cypress, olive orchards and vineyards.
    There in a niche at Orsanmichele, a scuplture by Verrocchio; here a garden or fountain; the grandeur of Santa Maria del Fiore and Baptistry with doors of bronze await in the magnificent piazza del Durmo, A stroll over the Ponte Trinita, one can imagine Dante's eyes first falling upon his immortalized Beatrice. And, oh! just down that street Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning lived, wrote and loved.

Santa Maria de Fiore

i porti bronzi by Gilberti

    These experiences, if only of a brief part of my life, are treasures I can bring to mind, opening a world alive with color, light, sound, warmth, movement and meaning—and beauty that in no way can be counted only remembered, and I love them in all ways and always!