The neighbor in Robert Frost’s poem proverbially remarked that “good walls make good neighbors.” But Frost never quite seems to buy it, musing that nature seems to have a contrary opinion.
“Something there is that doesn't love a wall,That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,And spills the upper boulders in the sun;And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.”
Walls, in other words, have a way of coming down. And though the neighbor in the poem resists it and religiously repairs the breeches, I am grateful for the gaps — especially those that are filled with doors that are hospitably opened.
Spello is a walled mountain village. Looked at — strolled through — from a certain perspective it has the feel of a fortress, which in a sense it was in the days when the Romans built the aqueduct to supply it with water, in the days when rivalries and conflicts were more fisted. Spello was built for precaution. The walls could be retreated behind. The gates could be closed and locked.
The threats have changed over the centuries, but Spello’s walls remain — its citizens adopting, perhaps, Frost’s neighbor’s side of the argument that good walls make good neighbors.
But if those gates and doors can close they can just as easily open, as happened yesterday — not by earthquake but through the agency of generosity.
We had been to the market in the lower piazza — that weekly congregation of tents, trucks and townsfolk displaying pots and plants and underwear, dresses and shoes — and were strolling back up the main road, passing one of the shopkeepers standing in her doorway. Our friends introduced us — the wondrous alchemy of friends introduced to friends by friends — and we spoke of gardens; ours back home, the ones we were planning to see around the village. And she insisted that we stop by and see her own. “Ciao” we all exclaimed and we continued on our way, depositing our bags in our respective residences before continuing our exploration.
Picking up our walk, we meandered along one sideway then another, before turning into still another until stopping near an iron gate in the stone wall that opened into a spacious but largely hidden garden. We turned toward a woman’s cheerful greeting — our shopkeeper friend — who led us through the gate and in among the flowers, the vegetables and the chickens. It was beautiful, and largely invisible to a passerby.
Completing the tour, our host invited us inside her home to see her husband’s work. Crossing in through a doorway cut into the opposite wall, we entered a room completely filled with a miniature village — handmade houses with tiny furniture and Lilliputian dishes and inhabitants, fields with vegetables and animals; a complete and expansive Italian village and countryside culminating in a nativity scene all intricately carved from stone and fashioned from plaster.
It was stunning — a masterpiece of minute detail and whimsically exacting imagination. And then we were invited into their living space above — ostensibly to see more of his artistic creations, but almost certainly to feel welcomed into the intimacy of their space. The art was masterful, but the hospitality within these stone walls was overwhelming.
We descended the steps to the sunlit via outside, voicing our “mille grazies” and “buona sera’s”, and continued on our way; mostly silent for awhile, each of us reflecting on what we had seen and the privilege we felt at being invited behind the walls to see it.
“Imagine what other wonders are kept silently behind these walls,” we pondered with a mix of awe and reverence, humility and gratitude.
“Good walls make good neighbors,” insisted Frost’s own neighbor; and while I suppose there could be some truth to that I don’t subscribe to the belief. What I can say with conviction, however, is that whatever the value of the walls, real friends know the passages through them...
...and use them.
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