Wind on water

Over the wide sea
flies a wind, brushing, curving,
a swift with dark wings.

Sopelana, November 2011

The power of silence

Born and bred in this alpine village, nineteen year old Mehdi lost his life at work through a typically brave and generous act. During a routine cleaning of the silo in the woodwork shop, he saw his two young companions in trouble, leaped in to help them and was tragically buried under a mass of collapsing sawdust.

The entire resident population of the village turned out for the young man’s memorial service, some fifteen hundred people filling the narrow street that ascended the hill by the little stone church. A late autumn sun gave warmth to the scene as we waited in silence while the rites were performed.

Afterwards, a way was left clear for the cortège to pass, led by a mountain rescue vehicle with Mehdi’s two fire helmets displayed on the bonnet. Here youngsters like Mehdi join up in their teens for the volunteer fire service. A keen skier, he was also a member of the mountain rescue team and his colleagues were there to pay him honour, lining the road with their trained rescue dogs on leashes.

Something remarkable was present in our gathering. The silence. A silence in which some higher spirit seemed to breathe. The very quietness emphasised the strength and dignity of these teams, who stand by to deal with emergencies of every kind that the mountains deliver. They are used to dealing with tragedies, risking their own lives to save others and to retrieve victims, often in the worst conditions. Mehdi himself was a living expression of this community ethos and as he grew up, took his place in their ranks.

I have always admired mountain people and the habitual, daily strength they develop, living in these beautiful places which hold so many dangers. There is a dramatic tension in those opposites: splendour and danger. Therein, “a terrible beauty is born”, as Yeats put it.

In silence, the beauty appears.

CJM