This was the litany that on June 24, after school was over and as soon as the summer began, then began the novena to the Madonna delle Grazie, or to the Madonna di Santa Maria del Piano in Lioni.
"Oh Mother of Graces,
that you carry Graces in your arms,
I come to you for Graces,
oh, Maria, give me Graces! "
On the bridge of Ofanto, at half past six in the morning, I met with the women of the village devoted to Mary and, on the way that led us to the church, we recited the rosary, interspersing it with the popular prayer pronounced with pious conviction.
Reaching the churchyard of the ancient place of worship, before the mass began, I rested on the stone seat under the grate of the left window, to hear the tolling of the bells and to smell the warm air that smelled of fresh hay, of milk fresh from the cows and of the lilies.
Around, only the calm and the voice of some peasant who, from dawn, had begun the work of the harvest.
Saint Elizabeth and Mary stood on the altar on the right side. They talked.
With a serene face. On the sides of the church, in one of the side niches, I was intrigued by the wooden statuette of the Crowned Madonna of Foggia, who, sitting among the branches of a tree, seemed to observe the faithful.
After mass, listened to with devout participation, a compulsory stop was at "Maria de Savino" and "Peppo de Scanola", under the red mulberry tree next to the dilapidated well.
For me, it was a childhood ritual.
Maria, quick, tall and always thin, took a sheet, which we all held by the edges, and began to shake the tree. Mulberries fell from the branches as if by magic.
Not being able to resist the scent and smell of sweets, I rushed to eat as many as I could. Below, there was the well.
I liked to watch the iron bucket fall to the bottom and, touching water, emit a deep, dull thud. The chain launched into the void, into the dark.
From above, the reflections of the fresh water were visible, in which the moon was reflected at night ... I haven't eaten mulberries for years.
And for years I have not seen trees of this fruit that evoke the east.
I don't know if the tree and the well are still there, where I imagine they are, on the left before Maria's house, on the way back to Lioni.
However, in the early evenings of July, when even in Genzano the air tastes of wheat and, in the more open countryside it is possible to meet fireflies, I like to think that everything has remained motionless, in Santa Maria "Gnano".
That from the sturdy branches of the mulberry tree, shaken by someone, will fall those sweet fruits that taste of old times and that the bucket, creaking now rusty, continues to fall into the well, meeting the water and bringing it to the surface.
Just as today, after many years, memories resurface and rise from the hidden and tortuous meandering of my soul ...
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