A meeting at dawn

Animals on the island

by Paola Boni


Impertinent seagulls look at you.

Vain cats pose as models for tourists in the harbor.

Busy ants carry in single line wild fennel seeds.

Dogs stroll through the square and alleys in the village center, as Billy, the Marettimo tourist guide.

Nino's donkeys make trekking in the heart of the mountain.

Bored horses wait for delicacies from compliant vacationers.

Nice cows and robust bulls wait for the evening meal at the Faraglione peak.

But if you go for a walk early in the morning, you may encounter other islanders, certainly less apparent, especially if the garden, once belonging to a passionate couple of aloe collectors botanists, offers plenty of berries and seeds.

He is proud of his plumage, he boasts, he walks in front of me with indifference as he continues to grumble, he looks at me and he lets me take pictures of him. He pinches around a yellow lantana bush and then he slides under the dwarf palms. He walks towards the cube of lovers.

He is vain. She is shy, timid, reserved. She is crouched between the rows of shrubs perfectly camouflaged.

I follow him very slowly down to the corner of the aloe vera and then I see her: shy, fearful, reserved. She is nestled between the shrubs and perfectly camouflaged. As soon as she senses my presence, unlike the male, she crawls slowly between the aloe macula succulent lanceolate leaves, in ocher-colored earth with white spots, just the same shade of her plumage.

I do not know how it is possible, but in a moment both of them disappear from the aloe garden.

On the island there are also them ... try to meet them.

 

 

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