Momentary Blindness - Piazza Navona

Although I am aware of its presence by sound, the running water fades in and out of the background, in and out of my awareness, becoming louder and softer as different groups of languages pass me. Their speakers’ footsteps are silenced beneath the sound of running water and voices. The water sounds both weighted and light as it is bright and buoyant, yet carries over everything else. The layers of voices create a language of their own. They are a simple wave when so densely packed together, a roar almost akin to the fountain’s water, broken only by the occasional distinguishable phrase: “Where are you?”; “selfie stick?” An obnoxious squeaking sound sometimes rises above the lull, horrible, strange, and disruptive.

A tour group arrives right next to me, and for a moment I listen to a description of the Piazza Navona in Spanish. It feels like a million people are milling about with no footsteps, just their voices to distinguish who they are, where they are, and where they are going as they fade. The presence of water is a cool counterpart to the bustling crowds as droplets carry themselves on the wind to the back of my neck. Similarly cool is the bar of the fountain I am sitting on. It is as if the entire space was made to balance its inhabitants. Although my feet still hold most of my weight, the fountain has transformed into a place of rest: the side to rest your feet, the water to rest from the heat, and the statues to rest your eyes—when they return.

(5/21/19. Piazza Navona)