Nashcmarkt

The blows on the back. Marie. Behind the blows, the town hall. Behind the town hall, the councillors. Above the councillors, the ringing of bells. Above the ringing, God. Behind that, the emptiness. Arms bound. No other sound.

            The Paulist Church, Auerbach’s Cellar, Naschmarkt, the Old Exchange. All past. Marie has black hair. On happy days, braids. All past. That was all. My final gift. One evening in June. I placed the band of fire around her neck. That was all. Over her heart, the knife. Above the ringing, God. Behind that, the emptiness. Paulist Church, Auerbach’s Cellar, Naschmarkt, Old Exchange. No other sound. Behind the emptiness, the roaring. Behind the roaring, the crowd. The councillors behind that.

            On the cart: Me. Two eyes, two temples, two ears, two arms, two legs. I see, I hear, I stand. The cart has two wheels. The wheels turn in the same direction. I have only one head, one mouth. That’s not enough.

            Behind the silence, the roaring. Behind the roaring, the crowd. The cart in between. On the cart: Me. You see me hearing, you see me riding, you see me seeing you. You think that I’m screaming. That’s why you scream.

            You don’t see me seeing you. On happy days, braids. All past. You’re thinking of nothing, you see nothing. You never thought anything about it. Marie. What day is it today. How do you get to a day like this. What did you really think about it.

            Why am I getting off this cart now. How do you go up the little steps, with arms tied behind your back. Marie, I’m asking you. How did this stone get onto the market square, with those gutters for the blood to run off. Where did these people come from, and what for. You and I. Above that, the ringing. Other bells. Another wagon. And our daughter. All past. Where did these people come from. Why is some guy pressing my head to the stone. Why is he wearing a mask made of cloth. Why is the cloth black. Your hair is black, Marie. Around your neck, a fire. You say nothing, you can’t say anything more. Tell me what day today is, and your real name. Your name is: All past.

            Marie, that’s our name now. That was all. All past. Above the ringing, you and I, behind that, the emptiness. Paulist Church, Auerbach’s Cellar, Naschmarkt, Old Exchange. This stone with the gutters. That’s all.

            Over the heart, the knife. Our names, Marie: All past. You and I, that’s who we are, that’s what binds us. The sword is over me. Above that, the emptiness. My name is Johann Christian Woyzeck. It is Wednesday, the twenty-seventh of August 1824. How do you get to a day like this. Marie. All past is no name. You and I, behind that, the emptiness. Paulist Church, Auerbach’s Cellar, Naschmarkt, Old Exchange. The sword is over me. What is your real name, Marie. In three seconds I’ll be dead.

Thuringian Scenes

For Toni Weber

1.

How to tie a hangman’s knot. The real kind, I mean – coiled, tightly wound, like in the movies. He showed me how to do it.

Then I killed him and strung him up.

2.

On visitors’ day my mother asked me what it was like when they drove me from Jena to Erfurt. Asked if I’d seen the Ettersberg, Buchenwald, the concentration camp with the memorial and the tower.

3.

Her name was Sylvie and she sat three rows behind me. The very first time I walked into the classroom I fell in love with her. First her eyes. I’d never seen anything like it before. They’d change color when I looked at her, from dark brown to pale blue, and they’d just light up. All I had to do was turn around.

4.

Once, gym class was cancelled and we happened to meet all alone in the hall. Through the closed doors of the other classrooms you could hear somebody’s explanation of the universe, while Kolbich had the third graders rehearsing the national anthem.

So I pressed her back against the coats hanging there and pulled her skirt up. She pushed my hands away and opened her mouth and tried to get her tongue into mine. She must have read about that some­where.

5.

At lunchtime recess they were waiting for me in plainclothes.

6.

We also went to the outdoor movies a couple of times. She wouldn’t even let me kiss her. No action with her.

7.

Slandering an official of the state: I was sixteen, so I went to juvenile detention.

8.

He was in for breaking and entering and he was my brigade leader. We worked at the die press, just eight-hour shifts, because we were all minors.

9.

The concentration camp with the memorial and tower, where your brother died, dear Mother? No, I didn’t see it, because I rode from Jena to Erfurt in a closed van without windows.

10.

At the trial, my chemistry teacher asked for acquittal.

11.

After work came structured free time. The barracks monitor was in charge of that.

12.

The first time was in the shower. The brigade leader told me to stay and mop the changing room. He was waiting with the barracks monitor.

They dropped their pants and held me down. I had to give them oral sex.

13.

They gave me chocolate, and our quota on the die press was reduced by 200 sheets.

14.

The second time was when our whole shift was supposed to see the movie I Was Nineteen during structured free time.

The barracks monitor held the door on the toilet stall shut so I couldn’t get to the movie on time.

15.

They protected me from the guards when it was my turn for barracks duty.

16.

The third time was in the die press storage room.

17.

The following Friday was my eighteenth birthday.

18.

The following Friday I asked the barracks monitor to show me how to pick a padlock with a pin. He didn’t suspect a thing.

19.

In the afternoon I had a visit from my mother. She cried and asked me again if I’d seen the Ettersberg and the memorial.

20.

One week later I asked the barracks monitor if he knew how you tie a noose, like in the movies, with the winding and all.

21.

He knew how.

22.

At twelve on the dot, when the siren wailed out the end of lunch break, I killed the barracks monitor in the storage room. The siren was still wailing as I took a rope with a proper noose that I’d tied myself, threw it over the rail for the overhead crane, and hoisted up the barracks monitor.

23.

Then it was all quiet.

24.

I’m on the way to Brandenburg Penitentiary now, for premeditated murder.

25.

That’s my life. I’m eighteen. Time for bed.

Note:

Told in the basement holding facility of the county prison in Weimar, April 1980.

(1982)

Requiem

Places: Love, perhaps humankind’s most powerful energy ¾ where does it go, where is it now? ¾ Is one of those great questions that have interested ¾ and occupied ¾ me all my life.  ¾ Places: In several thousand years it’s said there will be no more human life on earth. Surviving will be fishlike creatures, silver­lings having the appearance of medieval jousting masks with tentacles hanging down, and perfectly adapted millipedes of enormous size.

Places: I can imagine one of them ¾ a loose page of poetry, blown by a galactic wind against the leg of one of those millipedes and getting caught there. On the fluttering paper is a poem with my name as author. And it’s a love poem. That must suffice for us. That we were alive. In various places, and bore witness with love’s IN SPITE OF THAT:

We were the ones with the fluttering heart. 

• (14 January 2006)