Stone bridges in Bruges (Belgium)

The evening peace blows gently into the quiet city,
The sun's golden blood flows in the canals,
And a longing that has neither way nor words,
Now start telling about the gray towers.

The old bells sing dully and beautifully
Of days when their shout spanned the land,
There was a special splendor deep down in the streets
And merrily the pennant game of the harbor burned,

...

Bruges, 

poem by Stefan Zweig

Beguinague Bridge over the Dijver canal in Bruges (Belgium)

In 1488 the people of Bruges had executed one of the town administrators belonging to the court of Maximilian of Austria, husband and successor of duchess Mary of Burgundy. The town administrator was called 'Pieter Lanchals', a name which means ' long neck'. The Lanchals family coat of arms featured a white swan. Legend has it thatMaximilian punished Bruges by obliging the population to keep swans on their lakes and canals till eternity. 

Legend about the swans of Bruges.

Bridge of the Ezelpoort (Donkey Gate) in Bruges (Belgium)

In the ancient town of Bruges,
In the quaint old Flemish city,
As the evening shades descended,
Low and loud and sweetly blended,
Low at times and loud at times,
And changing like a poet's rhymes,
Rang the beautiful wild chimes
From the Belfry in the market
Of the ancient town of Bruges.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Meestraat Bridge over the Green Canal in Bruges (Belgium)

Has not this city vanished? Oh, look there,
(as if through some unfathomable law)
transposed, in those blank depths it lies, defined,
as though life there were of a wonted kind;
hugely the luminous gardens hang, enshrined,
and suddenly the dance coils there, behind
the lighted windows of the hostelries.

And overhead?—The silence, indolent,
leans, slowly crushing sweetness on her tongue:
grape upon fragrant grape, from luculent
clusters of chimes in the far heavens hung.

Rainer Maria Rilke 

about Bruges

Saint Boniface Bridge and Minnewater Bridge in Bruges (Belgium) painted by Vanschootacker

Minewater lake was named after a girl named Minna. In Roman times two lovers were separated while the young warrior went off to war. Minna promised to wait for him, but during his long absence her father gave her in marriage to someone else. On the eve of her marriage Minna desperately ran away and hid in the woods. When the warrior returned he went looking for Minna, but when he found her she was exhausted and died in his arms. He built a dam in the creek near the tower, let the water drain out and buried Minna in the center. Then he broke the dam and again flooded the lake. Minna remains in the bottom of her beautiful lake.

Legend of Bruges

Saint Boniface Bridge over a canal in Bruges (Belgium)

Ay Marieke Marieke je t’aimais tant
Entre les tours de Bruges et Gand
Ay Marieke Marieke il y a longtemps
Entre les tours de Bruges et Gand

Song by Jacques Brel

Beguinague Bridge over the Dijver canal in Bruges (Belgium) painted by Vanschootacker

...a medieval hamlet, a small town apart from the other city, even more dead.

The  Beguinague in

Bruges-la-Mort

Georges Rodenbach

Meebrug over the Green Canal of Bruges (Belgium)

"Ville fantôme, ville momie, à peu près conservée. Cela sent la mort, le Moyen Age, Venise, les spectres, les tombeaux.."

                                                                Charles Baudelaire

Beguinague Bridge over the Dijver canal in Bruges (Belgium)

THE Spirit of Antiquity--enshrined
In sumptuous buildings, vocal in sweet song,
In picture, speaking with heroic tongue,
And with devout solemnities entwined--
Mounts to the seat of grace within the mind:
Hence Forms that glide with swan-like ease along,
Hence motions, even amid the vulgar throng,
To an harmonious decency confined:
As if the streets were consecrated ground,
The city one vast temple, dedicate
To mutual respect in thought and deed;
To leisure, to forbearances sedate;
To social cares from jarring passions freed;
A deeper peace than that in deserts found!

Poem Bruges

William Wordsworth

Beguinague Bridge over the Dijver canal in Bruges (Belgium)

Welcome Winter, how cracks your ice?
Fills your snow the valleys?
I have here spring thaw at the hearth
And no fire to fetch.
Blow you storm, through the firmament?
Wall and roof can bare it.
Pour you dampness down in streams?
My glass shall aside it put.

Guido Gezelle, 
poet born in Bruges