Here is the last verse of a powerful chapter with Isaiah speaking: ‘Even the young men will get weary and fall but those that wait on the LORD will renew their strength; they will mount up with wings as eagles; they will run, and not be weary; and they will walk, and not faint.’ Isaiah 40: 30,31
The statue you can see is made of local marble and was built by Heinrich Natter, 1889.
He was a sculptor from Vinschgau.
The name of the man whose statue dominates the square is Walther Von der Vogel Weide.
Who was he and when did he live?
He was a poet born in Austria in 1170 and died in Würzburg in 1230.
Here is a translation of part of one of his poems:
Allas! Where have all the years gone?
Did I dream my life, or is it real?
What I always thought - was that something?
Then I've slept and don't know it...
Now I'm awake and no longer know
What used to be familiar as my hands:
People and places where I was raised from childhood
They are strangers to me, as if it were all lies
Those who were my playmates are old and indolent.
Meadows are farmed, forests are felled,
If it were not for the water, which flows as ever before.
Ah, then I'd believe that my misfortune is truly great...
The poem continues with its theme of existential loss and social decline. He also explored the themes of love, nature and country life. ‘ Under the Lime tree’ is an example.
Then, just below, Walther’s statue is a singer and ventriloquist. We are now in 2025, a whole 795 years later, and here is someone special entertaining the public. The Latin venter for belly and loqui for speak make this word, and this slim man sings so well from his belly that I had to look carefully to see how his larynx was moving.
He sang for a long while until all of a sudden there was lightning above the statue and steeple with thunderclaps and we all made for cover. In my photograph, there are hardly any clouds but they rolled in quickly and became dark.
I saw the busker and wanted to know his name but I didn’t get it. Here is a video I took of part of what was a fine performance.
Our day in Bolzano ended abruptly and we travelled on…
Here are two thoughts with the word abrupt.
‘ Sometimes people hide behind a kind of naturalistic milieu. But life is full of the sharpest, abrupt changes of tone, from tragic to the absurd.’
Tom Burke ( English actor.)
‘ However long, it’s the presence of other people that brings out the weirdness – that collision of our way of being with the everyday lives of others, the abrupt awareness – always a surprise no matter how often it’s happened – that their lives are very different from our own.’
Lynn Coady ( Canadian novelist and journalist.)
Take care,
Sandy 🙂