Cemeteries

MaschataDiop

by MaschataDiop

Story

Headache weather. But the sun is shining. A walk would do me good. Going further away by public transport does not. So I go to the adjacent cemetery, south-west. As soon as I enter the old part, I don’t see the uniform-looking gravestones here, but those of the “Cimitero Acattolico” in Rome in front of me. In 2010, I lived not far from this “non-catholic” cemetery” for three and a half months. Many foreign Protestants were buried here. I found the last resting place of August Goethe. Although the gravestone only says “Goethe’s son”. The grave of Antonio Gramsci was also quite inconspicuous. Writer, journalist, philosopher and co-founder of the Italian Communist Party. Died after long years in prison, at the age of 46. On the tombstone of the British poet John Keats are the words “Here lies one whose name was written in water”. In cursive. At the bottom. On the plinth.

Italian immigrants, tourists, members of all religions, but also atheists are buried here. Some have been buried here for almost 300 years, not far from Porta San Paolo, at the foot of the Pyramid of Cestius. Walking there is like immersing yourself in another world. Under fragrant cypresses, palms and pines. It is a sunny spring day. I see ivy-covered angels, stelae, mausoleums, stone and marble figures, artistically mourning. Sarcophagi decorated with inscriptions. Lying cast on one, the figure of a young man. “He was loved by all who knew him”: Devereux Plantagenet Cockburn, a British dragoon. 1850, died at the age of 21. His likeness has lain here ever since, gazing thoughtfully into the afterlife with pupil-less eyes. It seems to me. In its left hand a book, its thumb a bookmark between the marble pages. A stone cocker spaniel has snuggled up to the stone body.

Leaves rustle. Not a dog. A cat. One of many that live here on the grounds of this park-like cemetery. The strays are fed, cared for, medically treated and neutered by animal-loving people. So that the “gatti della Piramide” don’t become any more.

I hear the gentle buzzing of a crow. I am in Vienna’s second largest cemetery. It is February. My gaze wanders over the graves. I notice that many of them have putti sitting on them. Small, childlike angels, mostly in white, their chins resting in their hands, others looking upwards, towards the sky. Which is blue today. A statue stands, half-length, curly hair. The young angel looks earnestly at the grave, his right wing broken off, also the little finger of his right hand, in which he holds a rose. Leaves rustle, the air is wintry. Chilly. On a heart-shaped stone the inscription: “Sometimes silence is louder than a cry”.

© MaschataDiop 2021-05-17

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