10 June 1942
Cara Gianna,
The hills here are green and gentle, but bare in comparison to your father’s grove- none of that silver the leaves turn when the wind moves through them. I keep looking for it. The light is wrong, somehow. Still, it feels wrong that such places should hear artillery at all.
We arrived four days ago. I won’t say where as the censors have their red pencils ready and I have learned not to give them the satisfaction. What I can say is that the countryside is not unbeautiful, and there are mornings here that remind me, just slightly, of the road up to your place in July, when everything smells of heat and dry grass and something faintly sweet I could never name.
I keep your father’s address, as I promised. I have it written in the cover of my Leopardi.
Life here is repetitive in a way I was not prepared for. I had imagined war as a series of events. It isn’t. Instead it is a great deal of waiting, punctuated by movement, punctuated by more waiting. The men around me are decent enough mostly. There is a boy from Agrigento named Sandro who has never seen snow and seems to believe I am personally responsible for the climate. There is a Corporal Biondi who plays the harmonica. There is a man named Fabbri who... has opinions.
I have been trying not to think too much about what I left behind. It is easier said than done, as you may imagine.
Write to me, if you like. Tell me whether Pietro has been cooperative this year. Tell me what the grove looks like now, at the start of summer, when it’s at its best. I want something true to read.
Il tuo Amerigo
