Mainz All Mine

On my way back from Bremen, I had a one-hour layover in Hannover. I left the train station and explored downtown a bit. I was really struck by the Aegidienkirche, a ruin preserved from the damage of World War II. As you can see, a vine climbs one end of the roofless chapel. I just had to write a poem to keep the memory of this peaceful place. -- JD Two, gnarled vines Twist and wind their aimless way Up church walls. Their green Leaves a canvas where the Wind, Constant as cloudforms, Pains expressionist patterns. Hannover. War raged-- 1944. The bombs Erased this chapel: Aegidienkirche, windows Rafters, roof, and doors Ablaze, blown out. Utter ruins. 1945. Spring. Seeds carried by the winds Sink roots in rubble. Water, light, they rise along The western wall, their spreading Branches, leaves carpet The walls: a nodding, dancing chorus of Amens.

In the middle of the marketplace stands a column called the " Heunensäule ." Erected there in 1975 to mark the 1,000th anniversary of the building of Mainz Cathedral, it was a column that had been quarried but never used by the original builders. Around the base of the column are four bronze headpieces, each a symbol of Mainz's history: a bishop's mitre, for the Archbishop of Mainz's role as head of the German Church and one of seven electors of the Holy Roman Emperor; a gladiator's helmet, representing Mainz's Roman history; a jester's hat, to show Mainz's place as a carnival city; and, finally, an imperial crown (pictured, right) . The crown is recognizable to students of German history as the Rheichskrone , an octagonal crown studded with jewels and topped by a cross. The crown was created in the early years of the Holy Roman Empire (HRE), probaby the 10th or 11th century. It has been passed down, emperor to emperor ever since , and it can still...

 The first thing one notices about Mainz is its Dom , officially named St. Martin's Cathedral . (If you look carefully at the roof of the cathedral, you will see a statue of the generous Roman officer riding his horse away from the Rhine--in the photo below, the statue is hidden, but it lies to the right of the central tower.) Mainz was the birthplace of Christianity in Germany. An English missionary, St. Boniface , arrived in the early 8th Century, to christianize the peoples beyond the Rhine. His efforts were successful, and Mainz became Germany's first archbishopric, eventually becoming the center of German Christianity similar to the position of England's archbishops of Canterbury -- with one important difference: as Germany grew to an empire, the Archbishop of Mainz held one of seven key electoral votes in the choosing of the emperor. Begun in 975, the cathedral is a chaotic mishmash of architectural styles that emerged over the centuries it took to complete the thing....