SUPERSTICIÓN

On my way to market,
passing Marienkirche, "im Schatten der Platanen" (sham Mycenean )

passing salty Punks w/ dogs. Standing on fountain wall clutching Sterny.
Piss smell, misty distances. Dunstig auch im Kopf.

"wrest from me the palm of beauty"

Truly, take it by force. Not as difficult as you might think

"wo durch Blumen der Cephissus rann"

If I had found you there, Geliebter, how differently I would have embraced you.
Noch ein grauer Tag, not made for embracing anything.

"wo die Herzen Sokrates gewann"

Winsome walks of erstwhile presence
A grey marble tomb, as big as a living room. "It's simply what I deserve"
How would I have embraced you 50 years ago, 100 years ago, 250 years ago?


You, you smiling youthful man, you walk with a certain blindness, a strength-- your long pants flare out at the bottom, your lenses hide your eyes. But the sun itself is in hiding today. What is an overcast spring day to you, what does it mean? What is a joyful German meant to think underneath thick gray clouds?

"eso es lo que mata tu amor"

I'm not very unhappy today, but I would say that Berlin is a dead city, a city of the dead, comprised mostly of deadly spectres, more dead than any city I've ever seen. This does is not to say that it is dull here; there is a vitality but it is the vitality of ghosts. A cemetery is full of people who are mourning but sometimes also people like myself and Julien, who walk on the grassy paths, green grass thriving from the flesh of dead humans. We are not overcome with emotion or regret. Indeed, we sometimes laugh. Look how big that tomb is.
Berlin is a cemetery for many things, such as: communism, fascism, youth cultures of all sorts. The corpses of German Literature simply float in the river around Museuminsel, bloated and bobbing. They float by, unnoticed by young Germans, sitting in hammocks on the riverbank with tiki torches, palm trees, drinking Beck's to salsa music DJ'd from a laptop.
The obsequies of arrogant 80s culture have been dutifully carried out.—In other words maybe it is now left up to Americans to be Germanists.


The [PUNX] continued to grieve and muse
    poor [PUNX], secretsmiling [PUNX]
    berooding the banks awynto the river.

"Jetzt aber sitz ich unter Wolken (deren Ein jedes eine Ruh hat eigen)...
und fremd erscheinen und gestorben mir Der Seligen Geister."


—in Düsterkeit klirren die Fahnen.