Centuries of absorbed sunlight radiate from warm stone walls that beg to be touched. I wanted to experience the Assisi of St. Francis, so I received permission to stay for a week at the monastery. I took my meals in the town, but slept in a small monastic cell with a window opening onto the rosemary-scented vineyard overlooking the Valley of Spoleto. Every night I was under the same roof with the brothers of St. Francis, and sometimes fell asleep to the echoes of their plainsong chant. Assisi is a wonderful walking town, and I strolled in la Piazza del Comune — the town square — with its kitchen doors exuding the warm scents of garlic, oregano, olive oil, basil, and Asiago as clusters of chattering housewives sat in deep doorways shelling peas, while old men dozed in the late afternoon sun. I breathed deeply, and echoed Henry James' exclamation on arriving in Italy: "At last — for the first time — I live!" Assisi's most resplendent spiritual site is the Basilica of Saint Francis, celebrating the saint who, in 1206, formed a religious community whose members lived among the poorest members of society. His deep love for all God's creatures has made him one of the most beloved Christian saints. The Basilica is actually two churches built one on top of the other. You begin in the dark, subdued 13th-century Bacilica Inferiore (Lower Church) amid flickering candles, curling incense, and murmured prayers. Here you view Pietro Lorenzetti's graceful "Saint Francis with the Four Angels" and Cimabue's impassioned frescoes of the renunciate Francis stripping off his fine clothing before his father. Most evocative of all is the saint's rough burlap tunic and cowl, tattered and patched, in the inner sacristy. As you leave the Lower Church and ascended to La Basilica Superior, you step out of the insular world of the Romanesque and into the vast explosion of color and light that is Early Gothic. The Upper Church holds the famous cycle of "The Life of Saint Francis" depicted in the 28 panels that heralded the dawn of Renaissance painting. But the showpiece is Giotto's "Saint Francis Preaching to the Birds," which has drawn pilgrims for centuries. Here the little saint stands in a long brown cassock, beneath a young oak, and offers the gospel to his winged flock. For an even more moving sight than the painting itself, stand and watch the faces of visitors as they approach. They are transformed. In an age of cynicism and aridity, people’s first sight of Francis' radiant and openhearted act is wondrous to watch. Some weep. All are moved. This is a delicate visual miracle. But miracles are not confined to church walls, and one of the Franciscan brothers had hinted at a little-known spiritual site outside the town walls, so an hour later I was deep in the heavily wooded slopes of pine and blue hemlock on Monte Subasio. A bend in the little road revealed a simple stone hermitage. No Giottos here, just the primitive courtyard where Saint Francis came to lose himself in prayer. Assisi had one more surprise for me, because this was not the spot the brother had indicated, and I walked on to an old oak in a natural bowl above a rocky ravine. Had I seen this oak grove before? I looked closer. The centuries swirled and blended, carrying me back to the Basilica. The landscape had been painted on her wall. The Franciscan had directed me to the grove where Francis stood when he blessed the birds. There was a Giotto there: the original, the centuries-old sacred terrain Francis trod, marked only by the intervening seasons. I looked up. The air shimmered with a quiet iridescence. The branches of the ancient oak held a population of birds: white doves, rooks, and speckled brown magpies, just as in the fresco. These were the descendants of the avian congregation of Saint Francis. I closed my eyes and offered a prayer to Francis. As I took a deep breath, a mantle of oneness and harmony draped my shoulders. Time slowed and I was bathed in peace. Opening my eyes, I felt the birds, once blessed by Francis, were passing that grace on to me. The tranquil iridescence seemed to remain with me for timeless minutes. When you go to Assisi, you'll find that the spirit of Saint Francis is still there. Just walk out of his eight-gated city through La Porta Cappuccini to the Hermitage of the Carceri. Then keep going. Something luminous will be waiting for you. |
Assisi occupies a luminous realm between heaven and earth, floating above central Italy's sun-washed Umbrian plain on a deep green shoulder of Monte Subasio. The ancient walled town is a perfect destination for a pilgrim, its ocher walls anchored by the famous Basilica of Saint Francis to the west, and crowned by the stone battlements of a fourth-century castle, La Rocca Maggiore. The town's houses cascade across the slope washed in the colors of a faded Tintoretto, each the hue of a different rose: pink, cream, red, yellow, blush.