Terror of Beauty

I board the bus at 2.05pm in the centre of Trieste to ride to Sistiana and the Rilke trail. A cloudless sky, 26 degrees Celsius. The bus races along the bumpy Viale Miramare. The windows to the left offer a view of the Gulf of Trieste. I am touched for reasons as yet unknown.

Pines, oleander, parasols, parked scooters and people rush past behind the window. The promise of summer is tangible. I can see the sea in the background for minutes on end, the view interrupted only by the occasional truck or bus heading in the opposite direction. I begin to take pictures.

Later in the evening, back from my walk along the Rilke trail, I flip through his “Duino Elegies” and two lines attract my attention:

”For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror, which we are barely able to endure, and we are so in awe because it serenely disdains to destroy us. Every angel is terrifying.”