The tree-lined path within the Parco Tematico della Grande Guerra (Great War Theme Park) provides the perfect break between the Monfalcone of today and yesterday. I look to the left and in the scrub can makes out the first signs of disturbed ground. The vegetation tries modestly to conceal it from sight.

After about two hundred metres, an open space leads to a trench dedicated to a French general, Joseph Joffre. I drop into it and gradually disappear from view, hidden within the ground.

I stroll on, accompanied by a snake that moves agilely across the park, from quota (height) 98 to quota 121, passing through the monuments area of quota 85. In some places the trench disappears into the ground, where nature has sought to regain its normality.

By placing a hand on the surface of the trench, it is possible to perceive its irregularities. Sometimes these take the form of a word left by soldiers a hundred years ago to remind themselves they were still alive.

I come across a Madonna: a cave discovered in 1916 that sheltered hundreds of men in uniform.

Back on the path, I realise that I’m not walking just on the typical karst rock. Here it has been mixed with the iron of mortars, fired here for over two years like rain during a thunderstorm.

I look down and everywhere I find signs of the storm: a metal mesh emerges for a few centimetres from the ground, and a keen eye easily finds witnesses of the storm of iron and lead. Birdsong from the trees seems to mimic the clickety-clack of a machine gun.

 I lift my eyes to the sky, almost to convince myself that it’s over. The colours of spring give me relief. On these paths of iron, feet now tread only to remember and contemplate.