Only the mountain remains

I drive up the Furka Pass, looking for the Rhône Glacier. Didn't it begin here once?

I remember it from childhood: blue ice, cold and luminous. Whenever my father spotted the glacier, he would say, "His Majesty".

I keep driving. Nothing. Only weathered stone, dull and grey.

At the last hairpin bend before Hotel Belvédère, once vibrant, now empty, I stop.

Beyond it, where the glacier should be, I see only white cloths. Wrapped ice. A bandaged wound.

Ten years later, I drive up the Furka Pass again. Further, and further, and further. Against my better judgment.






© Frederike Kijftenbelt