Why was it Bavaria? The house in the forest was modest, a cabin, though rather substantial with latticework on the porch, a window in the gable. Each afternoon I walked to the village down a woodland path among great dark trees, across a bridge made of cedar poles. Patches of violets and forget-me-nots. At the cafe I smoked a cigar, drank coffee or lemonade, read a newspaper, wrote postcards, an occasional letter. I talked with the proprietor. I walked home at twilight and rested on the bridge, looking down into the stream, the weeds oscillating in clear water. I carried a stout walkingstick, a staff really, cut from a straight ash sapling. I did this for many years in my old age, and in the gable room wrote a number of better-than-average books. But I have never been in Bavaria. Used with the permission of Copper Canyon Press, P.O. Box 271, Port Townsend, WA 98368-0271, www.cc.press.org |