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Columns - Mythologies
by Matteo Trevisani




Once, I saw a god of crossroads. I was lost somewhere between Tuscany and Emilia. I had taken my father’s car without permission to visit the house of a poet who’d been dead for a century. It was closed. Before heading back, I walked a bit outside the village. There was a bridge over a river, tree branches touching the water, dry stone walls, and the dampness of things far away. Just after the bridge, the road split in two. At the fork stood a large wrought-iron cross. It made me think of Ireland, though I’m not sure why. Then I saw her. A woman sitting on a bench across the road, among the tall grass that grows along back roads. Crabgrass, stubborn poppies, nettles growing where no one looks—plants of the margins. And there she was, at the margin. Ageless. Wearing technical clothing, with a backpack and shorts, hiking boots, and a walking stick. Her knees were dirty with soil. She seemed to be waiting for someone or something. Seeing her unsettled me. She must have noticed, because she stood up and, limping as if hurt from walking too far, disappeared down the road.

I stood there at the crossroads, unsure which way to go. In the end, I turned around and walked back. Now I think she was Hecate, of course—the guardian of crossroads. Or Mercury, protector of thieves. Or Shiva dancing at the edge of worlds. Or Christ, appearing at the roadside—it doesn’t matter if it wasn’t really him. Being at the edge is something essential. There’s always some mystery when roads split—encounters and words that send you back, a private limit, a choice you have to make, a fate you carry even if you don’t want to. More than anything, that trekker reminds me now of Jacob. At one point in Genesis, Jacob wrestles with an angel who waits for him after he crosses a river. They wrestle all night, with no clear winner, until dawn breaks. Then Jacob asks for a blessing. Something changes his name, and he is wounded in the leg. His limp becomes the sign of having crossed a boundary—his initiation. From then on, every step he takes is both on the road and beside it, a way of walking that reveals the edge, the wound, and the name.

I still like crossroads, especially at dusk, when ghosts and spirits hide in the fading light and you see things that aren’t really there. And sometimes I think I’d like to sit where the darkness begins, among the nettles, and show anyone passing by that every edge is sacred—and that crossing it is sacred too.