Palatine Hill sighs


Deferentially my feet touch
the ancient ground on the Palatine
making almost no sound.
Yet like radars they detect
layers of whispers entrapped,
eagerly surfacing ghosts
from the depth of centuries.

Names dance in my mind
along with flashes of Rome’s origins,
shrill echoes of betrayals and intrigues,
giggles of extreme eccentricities,
visions of unbounded lavishness.
Fragments of influential voices
of Emperors and of their wives,
senators and leaders of the army
weaving the destinies of people,
of their own offspring
and of the whole world,
pondering the cruelest revenge
for the disgraced.
And for the unfaithful slaves.

Yet, at the core
of all of these whispers
I hear tunes of nightingales
filling my soul with visions of beauty
and conveying the aching sweetness
and the intoxicating passion
of love, of love ...

With a leap into the present era
I hear now my own shy voice
saying “yes” to my groom
of Norman ancestry
in the little church of
San Bonaventura on the Palatine,
built upon this history soaked hill
gaping right into the Coliseum.
A senator, a general of the army
a philosopher, an artist,
our wedding witnesses…

And suddenly my destiny
entwines with the destinies
of those who inhabited this place
in long gone moments of time.

Their sighs of sorrow and love
now raise the layers of dust
under which they slumbered
while waiting to join my own sighs,
deep, cosmic and endless,
rolling in alternate waves
of panic and ecstasy
over the forgotten splendor
of this monument
of human frailty and vanity.

Eventually
I resume my composure
to wear my nonchalant smile.
My sighs then slowly fade
into tranquility,
while their echoes
will forever roam across eternity.


*

Dear Margherita,
thank you for your lovely words.
Like nature, they have a timeless beauty.

Love,
vicky

Dear Margherita,

Thank you for your lovely and timeless description of the Palatine Hills.

Love,
Sue

Thank you Margherita, for sharing the beauty of your words with us.

Love,
Gisele

As beautiful as your words dearestest dpm (Dancing Pearly Margherita)!!!

quote: Originally posted by dear Margherita: And suddenly my destiny entwines with the destinies of those who inhabited this place in long gone moments of time.

I am SOOOOO glad my destiny has entwined with yours dear Margherita, angel from the "deep, cosmic and endless"... aaaaahhhhhh....


My sighs then slowly fade
into tranquility,
while their echoes
will forever roam across eternity.


My sighs then slowly fade
into tranquility,
while their echoes
will forever roam across eternity.


My sighs then slowly fade
into tranquility,
while their echoes
will forever roam across eternity.



while their echoes
will forever roam across eternity.




while their echoes
will forever roam across eternity.





will forever roam across eternity.



across eternity



eternity

Dear Vicky, dear Sue, dear Gisele and dear Teo, thank you each for the warm replies here. That most significant hill of the seven hills of Rome really is magnetic and it really has such a great influence in my life, as you can imagine ... I am glad you appreciated.

Dearest Teo, I so loooooooooooooooove your special way of letting my sighs fade into eternity!!! I will print this out and cherish forever. Thank you from my heart!

Love to all and have a beautiful day!

Margherita

San Bonaventura al Palatino (not sure whether this comes through as it is tripod ... but here is the link too:
http://members.tripod.com/romeartlover/Silent9.jpg

Another wonder-filled and wonderful poem.

Love,
Sylvie

Dear Margherita,

Thank you for sharing your feelings with us in so many beautiful words.

The Palatine Hills are very beautiful. I was there a long time ago and I still have fond memories of that place.

Love, Inda
***********

Dear Margherita, thank you for sharing your beautiful images and words with us.

I would love to visit Rome someday and look down from the Palatine Hills, absorbing all its antiquity and beauty.



Love,
yoko

Thank you for brightening my day with your loving comments, dear Sylvie, dear Inda and dear Yoko!

I love Rome and these special sites where my destiny has left its fingerprints.

Sometimes such intense emotions of our lives stretch so powerfully into the future and are lived once again as memories unveiling new details, which maybe were not perceived when they actually were lived.

Thank you again! Have a wonderful week-end!

Love,
Margherita

The inside of San Bonaventura al Palatino Church