Liede Bridge over the Pearl River in Guangzhou (China)

These indistinct pains at the city’s margins
like light from inlaid faux pearls, they are not mine
perhaps they belong to you, left behind by the whore called Bella.
These exquisite nights recalling sugarcane groves or thin palmettos
breathing Pearl River mist, they are not mine
perhaps they belong to you, hidden behind the back of the moon.
These plains that have never been marked on any map
and on which only half-built constructions rise, they are not mine
but belong to him and her, masked mendicants with silver bowls.

Poem by Liu Waitong

Sanchaji Bridge over the river Xiangjiang in Changsha, Hunan (China)

For three years exiled from the court, cooped up in this place;
through the ages only leaving behind the sorrow of this wanderer of Chu.
In autumn grasses alone, searching after the passage of others;
in cold woods, empty, seeing the sun slant in time.
The Han Wen Emperor has wisdom, yet his mercy is slight;
the waters of the Xiang are pitiless -- if one paid homage who would know?
In a lonesome, silent landscape is one's place to fall and settle;
pitying you: for what reason must you go to the end of the earth?

Translation of poem 

In Changsha, Passing by Jia Yi’s Residence

by Tang dinasty poet Liú Chángqīng

Bogenbrucke over the Rhine-Herne Canal in Gelsenkirchen, North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany)

Was seh' in der Ferne ich blitzen?
Vom Kirchturm die Spitzen!
Die Heimat ist nah!
Was hör' ich hier in der Menge?
Vertraut sind die Klänge!
Mein Freund wir sind da!

What do I see flashing in the distance?

The tops of the church tower!

Home is near!

What do I hear in the crowd?

The sounds are familiar!

My friend, we are here!

Beginning of Gelenkirchen
song by Georg Kreisler

Expo Bridge over the Geum River in Daejeon (South Korea)

 “2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the Daedeok Innopolis, the first year for Daejeon to make a new leap forward as a first-class economic city leading the future of Korea"

Park Yeon-byung, head of the Planning and Coordination Office of Daejeon City

Cau Váng Bridge or Golden Bridge in Da Nang (Vietnam)

“...we find only one tool, neither created nor invented, but perfect: the hand of man.”

Julio Ramón Ribeyro

Xinyun Bridge across the Taizi River in Liaoyang, Liaoning (China)

"The name Taizi literally means "crowned prince". During the late Warring States period, Jing Ke, an assassin sent by Crown Prince Dan of Yan for a mission of killing King Zheng of Qin, failed in the attempt. The Qin state retaliated with a massive invasion to conquer the Yan state. After the Yan state fell, Crown Prince Dan fled far into the Liaodong region, and was eventually tracked down and slain by the pursuing Qin forces. According to the legend, the prince's last site of refuge was at the bank of this river, hence the name."

Legend about the Taizi River

Footbridge over the Slupia River in Ustka, Pomerania (Poland)

Oj ty rzeko, oj rzeko, Czemus ty niepelna ?

Oy lolej, lolej lo lej, Czemus ty niepelna ?

Oj jakzez mnie pelna byc ? Ludzie chodza wode pic.

Oy lolej, lolej lo lej, Ludzie chodza wode pic.

Oh you river, oh river, why aren't you full?

Oh, la la la... why aren't you full?

Oh, how can I be full? People come to drink water.

Oh, la la la... People come to drink water.

Oj ty rzeko

Folk polish song

Pista e Re Bridge in Durres (Albania)

The mindless marching Roman menace
Could not break the mountain shields;
The slave-rowed greedy fleets of Venice
Could not buy Albania's fields.
The eagle's claws have felt no chains,
No tyrant cloud overcast its sky;
Fear never chilled its burning veins,
Nor caused a tremor in its stony eye.
It rose with glory in its beak -
Blazing like the dragon's breath
That tamed the highest snow-chilled peak -
Feared dishonour more than death.

From the poem The Flame of Albania

by Naim Frasheri

Zhivopisny Bridge crossing the Moskva River in Moscow (Russia)

Moscow,
extraneously apprehensive,
shiny towers of gold
cold as ice
Moscow
that once knew you
knows how your pulse has been burning
as days have gone by
...

Lyrics of the song Moskva

Vikingarna

Helix Footbridge across the Marina Bay in Singapore

Singapore has been incredibly well-managed. It was created out of the swamp, with a strong emotional idea: a safe place for mostly Chinese, but accepting other cultures and other races.

Nicolas Berggruen

Saeyeon Bridge between the islands Jeju and Saeseom (South Korea)

On Jeju Island, there are three holes in the ground, known as Samseonghyeol. This is the site where three demi-gods emerged in the era before the island was inhabited. The three are known as Go, Yang and Bu, and are also seen as the progenitors of those three family names, still prominents in the island today. The three lived by hunting and gathering until the arrival one day of a ship onto the beach with three princesses from the Kingdom of Byeongang. The princesses became brides for the demi-gods and  brought with them cattle and horses as well as five different seeds to establish agriculture on the island. 

Legend from the island of Jeju

Millenium Bridge across the river Morača in Podgorica (Montenegro)

They rose to where their sovran eagle sails,

They kept their faith, their freedom, on the height,
Chaste, frugal, savage, armed by day and night
Against the Turk; whose inroad nowhere scales
Their headlong passes, but his footstep fails,
And red with blood the Crescent reels from fight
Before their dauntless hundreds, in prone flight
By thousands down the crags and through the vales.
O smallest among peoples! rough rock-throne
Of freedom! warriors beating back the swarm
Of Turkish Islam for five hundred years,
Great Tsernogora! never since thine own
Black ridges drew the cloud and brake the storm
Has breathed a race of mightier mountaineers.

Poem Montenegro

Alfred Lord Tennyson

Millennium Bridge over the River Tyne between Gateshead and Newcastle upon Tyne, England (United Kingdom)

Five bridges cross the Tyne

And the city sits close by

For some go north and some go south

But each one seems to cry.

From the song Five Bridges
The Nice

Novy Most (New Bridge) over the Danube River in Bratislava (Slovakia)

Blue, muddy yellow or blood-red: the colour of the Danube varies according to history and geography. Never able to truly form the countries through which it runs into a single political entity, it nevertheless connects peoples and regions reconcilable only in dreams or poetry.

László Földenyi

Helix Bridge across Singapore River in Marina Bay area (Singapore)

"The Helix is truly an engineering marvel. While the structure is incredibly delicate and intricate, it’s been engineered to support more than 10,000 people at a time. The Helix is the first example of this structural solution applied to a bridge – there is nothing else like it."

Dr See Lin Ming,

the bridge designer

Bridge at the complex of KazMunaiGas company in Astana (Kazakhstan)

“Anybody who visits the city from anywhere, would find something familiar and comfortable, they could recognize something that they know, and at the same time they could be surprised.”

Amanzol Chikanayev,

Astana architect

Bogdan Khmelnitsky Bridge over the Moskva River in Moscow (Russia)

"Who wants to understand Russia, should know Moscow"

Anton Chekhov

Millennium Bridge over the River Thames in London (United Kingdom)

Thames. Her intimate greys slicken
and still. She puts on her best black.
Drips necklaces of sodium pearls.
She still takes the long way round
her glacial Ex – the one who left her
another dagger between her ribs of bridges.
She wants him back – his ins and outs
of ice. How he breezed in with promises
of peat, clay. Delicious alluvium.
So she dreams heroic North who creaked
and moaned and made her give, grinding
out her juice. She longs for weight
and cold. The broad shoulders.
The ruthless belly, snow-heavy
and white as the moon.

Poem to the Thames,

Mario Petrucci

Juscelino Kubitschcek Bridge over the Paranoa Lake in Brasilia (Brazil)

"The creation of Brasilia, the internalization of the government, was a democratic and irreversible act of effective occupation of our territorial emptiness"

Juscelino Kubitschek,

founder of Brasilia 

Sundial Bridge over the Sacramento River in Redding, California (United States)

''Though it is not the center of the world, it is a very beautiful environment for a bridge, with volcanic mountains and dense forests. It will be not only a passage but a place to sit and observe the water.''

Santiago Calatrava

designer of the bridge