Passage #31
Preamble
Selam’in Alei’küm is the last cry
I expected to hear in Vienna.
In peace these Turks came to live and to work
where Suleiman and his Janissaries
failed to breach the walls. Döner kebab wafts
over streets known for Wienerschnitzel.
Sleek Südtiroler Platz is our train stop
for Salzburg and its musical density,
which we abandon for the quietude
of Seekirchen and the Gasthof zur Post.
1.
Why are we stopped? Why are we all alone?
This is the end of the line. We are lost.
Train station is empty, but for the last
passenger heading for his bike. I ask,
Wo ist Obenhofen? On his Handy
he consults a timetable. Nine-thirteen
will be your next train. Or you can walk there.
Vielen Dank! As our guide pedals away,
at nine-twelve appears our train; nine-thirteen
we embark, relieved, for the Jakobsweg.
2.
Blue and yellow scallop shells on a post
point to our pilgrim path. Grüß Gott! I say.
A smiling white-haired lady offers two
apples from her front-yard garden. Danke schön!
Look at the sign on the woodpile. Only
two thousand one hundred seventy-three
kilometers left to Santiago!
That’s one hundred eighty days on foot.
A wooden sign is encouraging us.
Jeder Tag ist ein Geschenk dass man genießen soll.*
* Every day is a gift one should enjoy.
3.
Never mentioned in the song are the dead.
In whose memory was this chapel built?
I can ignore the genius loci
or ask his soul to be our spirit guide,
impelling us on Christ’s straight and narrow,
out of the Slough of Despond of Trump World.
The rising hill leads past cut and stacked logs
into a dark wood with high hunting stands
nailed to trees. It is not the killing time.
4.
At Wallersee, we sit and watch
pilgrims processing with a Marian
banner. It is Mary’s birthday today.
The Queen of Peace has resisted appeals
to militarize her image, unlike
Santiago, cast as the Moor Slayer.
Repurposed, he lives in Compestela,
repository of commerce, fetish,
inchoate longings and fulfilling dreams.
Our path leads to the bones of St. James. There,
“Refugees Welcome”–the quick and the dead.
5.
We stagger up stairs to Hotel Santner.
Too weary for a cafe, we eat in.
Grüner Veltliner, dunkles Brot, and cheese.
On the other side of an open meadow,
Charlotte has dropped far back. She limps
and tilts slightly to one side. The dreaded
Trendelenburg Gait! Too much pain to walk.
My muscle memory feels twinges too
My Camino travail is déjà vu.
One sharp descent; we chance upon a train!
6.
In Salzburg, Saint Sebastian’s agony
overlooks us as we sip espresso.
Minus backpack, spasms subside and calm.
Is it Advil, or the martyr, our guide?
Poetry appears in windows of shops.
Georg Trakl, tormented Austrian poet:
Es schweiget die Seele den blauen Frühling.*
*In blue spring the soul falls silent.
7.
The train to Bad Reichenhall leaves us off
seeking relief. Rückenschmerzen, I say
to the pharmacist standing in the street
helping another sufferer. She shows
us the best relieving cream to put on.
Königliche Kurhaus surrounds a park.
Forty minutes of Qi Gong in the shade.
In sun on deck chairs we lounge by fountains
of curative brine. The palliative drops
are hypnotic. We are taking the Cure.
8.
Top panel: St. Anne teaching Mary the Bible
On altar, left to right: St. Florian, St. Leonhard, St. Sebastian, St. Martin
Hanging altar cloth: German prayer embroidered around a host and a chalice
Jesus, dir lieb’ich. Jesus, dir sterb’ich.*
On the walk to Unken, right on the trail
I stop at this memorial chapel.
What was the communal source of such faith?
My first clue is an arrow-pierced image.
Sankt Sebastian was a Roman martyr,
protector against outbreaks of the plague:
Vienna, in year sixteen hundred seventy-nine.
Seventy-six thousand victims. We saw
a roadside memorial: all died,
save one woman, four kids, and the doctor.
*Jesus, I live for you. Jesus, I die for you.
9.
St. Martin’s Day celebrates the end of the harvest.
A Roman soldier , he once cut his cloak
in half to clothe a half-naked peasant
caught in a snowstorm. His help of the poor
and humility were heroic virtues.
To avoid being drafted as bishop,
Martin hid in a goose pen. Cackling
geese betrayed his presence. He is patron
of alcoholics, beggars, and soldiers.
Named in two thousand places just in France!
10.
Born 250 A. D. in Sankt Pölten,
Florian was a fire-fighting Roman soldier
who refused to sacrifice to Roman gods.
Sentenced to be burned at the stake, he prayed
and defied his fellow soldiers. Instead,
they threw him into the River Enns, a millstone
around his neck. In the shrine you can see
a little burning house near Florian.
Patron saint of Linz, upper Austria,
invoked against fire, flood, and lightning.
The Florian Cross, a popular badge in American fire companies
11.
Holding hanging chains and his bishop’s crook,
Léonhard secured release of prisoners,
became a monk. He prayed for successful
delivery of the Frankish Queen’s son.
With royal lands of Noblac given him
in recompense, he trained men freed from jail
for honest lives. Patron saint of women
in childbirth and of prisoners, he is
invoked against diseases of cattle.
All the cows and bulls we see are grateful!
12.
Her mother’s gift was knowledge how to read.
Mary places one finger on her lips.
Concentrating, she is absorbing what
Anne, her mother, is teaching her. In blue,
the daughter listens to her mother, in red.
Mary’s Magnificat is a pastiche
of Psalms and Prophets. I always wondered
how she amassed familiarity
with Hebrew longings in her outburst.
Mary and Anne look very Austrian.
13.
Seventeen petals on the metal cross
count the years of Martin Scheul’s young life.
On our path today, his fresh-faced image
reminds me: Jeder Tag ist ein Geschenk.
The winding road leads ever on and on.
In his philosophy Heraclitus
saw the stream one can never step in twice.
We worry about the future, but these bulls
are unaware of their fate. Just to be sure,
I hide my red bandana from their horns.
14.
Cowbells are noise for some; music for us.
A slippery downhill tightens me up.
We are borne across the gorge by bridges
engineered to withstand the rushing stream.
Fences and gates for cows, highways and paths
for us. Chapels and churches have banished
woodland fairies, daimonic Celtic
sprites of river, fog, mountain, and forest.
Farmers no longer plant by the waxing
moon, nor harvest crops by the waning moon.
15.
In case any demons are stalking us,
Sankt George thrusts his spear into the beast.
A white-walled chapel guards our Jakobsweb.
Over streams, Sankt John Nepomuk will protect
us from drowning by clutching river
daimons. Baroque churches have finished off
any powerful Celtic goddesses.
Mary has replaced them all. Regina
Coeli , crowned, co-opted by the Hapsburgs,
and the competing, aggrandizing monks.
16.
After Waidring, we are lost in the fields.
Irresolute, we start to cross a stream.
Sankt John Nepomuk appears before us.
A carved statue right in the middle of
the covered bridge: patron of those who drown.
Our Jakobsweg ends: Sankt Johann in Tirol.
St. John the Evangelist welcomes us.
Alexandra offers Johannisbeer*
drinks and Tyrolean music with harp,
concertina, and clacking wooden spoons.
YouTube view of Tyrolean Music
*currant juice
Epilogue
By noon we’ll be back in Salzburg. Rain clouds
gather in the mountains. Our Jakobsweg
ends with no communal festivities.
What differs pilgrims from tourists, really?
A mental journey, an Intent, a goal.
A willingness to be led along paths
by guides both spiritual and random.
Support of each other during travails.
Delight in each other at the day’s end.
The Way, surpassing maps, bells, rushing streams.
