In the streets of Cecilia, an illustrious city, I met once a goatherd, driving a tinkling flock along the walls."Man blessed by heaven," he asked me, stopping, "can you tell me the name of the city in which we are?""May the gods accompany you!" I cried. "How can you fail to recognise the illustrious city of Cecilia?""Bear with me," that man answered. "I am a wandering herdsman. Sometimes my goats and I have to pass through cities; but we are unable to distinguish them. Ask me the names of the grazing lands: I know them all, the Meadow between the Cliffs, the Green Slope, the Shadowed Grass. Cities have no name for me: they are places without leaves, separating one pasture from another, and where the goats are frightened at street corners and scatter. The dog and I run to keep the flock together.""I am the opposite of you," I said. "I recognise only cities and cannot distinguish what is outside them. In uninhabited places each stone and each clump of grass mingles, in my eyes, with every stone and clump.
Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities
cities, city