new poems by Tadeusz Rozewicz Page B

breed of hippopotamuses
brought gravity back to the Church

    Â 
    I see their huge bodies
immersed
in the living water
of faith hope and love
    Â 
    [January 31 2003]

learning to walk
    â€œlanggestreckt auf meiner Pritsche
starre ich auf die graue Wand”
    Â 
    for the last two years I’ve been taking lessons
from Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer
who was hanged
on April 9 1945
    Â 
    at the order of the Führer
Hitler Hiedler Hüttler
Hitler Schickelgruber
or whatever his name was
    Â 
    The Führer croaked on April 30
with his faithful dog
(poor dog)
    Â 
    in my long life
I’ve taken lessons not from poets alone
    Â 
    from Goethe Hölderlin Heine
Rilke
“Denn das Schöne ist nichts
als des Schrecklichen Anfang (...)”
    Â 
    Rilke to the end of his life
clung desperately

to women’s gowns
hiding in the folds of their skirts
till the day he died
he wore the girl’s frock
in which his mother
had dressed him
    Â 
    â€œshe was like a gown
ghastly and terrifying”
    Â 
    if he had only stayed for a moment
with Heinrich Ziell
Am Pferdefleischwagen!
But Rilke chose the angel’s tower
chose the Princess of Thurn und Taxis
so I left him and went to seek
instruction from Brecht
on the way I met Grabbe
(extraordinary fellow!) and Benn
    Â 
    Bonhoeffer I met in Wrocław
    Â 
    start from the beginning
start again he would say to me
learn to walk
learn to write to read
to think
    Â 
    you must accept the fact
that God has gone from this world

he isn’t dead!
you have to accept the fact
that you’re an adult
that you have to live
without a Father
    Â 
    and he also said
that you have to live with dignity
in a godless world
without counting on punishments or rewards
    Â 
    did I not sin
comparing the Führer
to a dog? after all he was a man
he had a mother and father
a sister and brother
he was an artist he left
watercolors and drawings
he was a writer he loved Wagner
he left “Mein Kampf”
there are rumors in my country
that “Mein Kampf” has been published
in Polish but no one
has seen or heard anything . . .
alas the Führer croaked
and the Jewish problem still awaits
its final solution
“Endlösung der Judenfrage”

    Â 
    Jews Arabs Poles and Germans
are a little oversensitive
everywhere they detect antisemitism
and yet the forest of trees
planted by the hands of the Righteous
grows green thickens
rises to the windows of our
homes
there are excellent comedies
about Auschwitz Majdanek Sobibor
the Passion and the Holocaust are becoming
ever more profitable
four hundred million dollars is serious money
not a mere thirty pieces of silver
    Â 
    we sat in the shade of trees
in a small beer garden near
St. Elizabeth’s
    Â 
    Bonhoeffer read me
the poems he wrote in Tegel
    Â 
    â€œlanggestreckt auf meiner Pritsche
starre ich auf die graue Wand”
    Â 
    I gazed at the Light at his monument
that has no head no arms
    Â 
    what if God has taken fright
and abandoned the Earth?

instead of answering
my question
he put his finger to his lips
    Â 
    does it mean
that you won’t that you can’t
answer my question
    Â 
    wrapped in a stinking blanket
his eyes closed
he listened to the gray wall of his cell
with the eyes of his imagination
he painted it in wildflowers
cornflowers marigolds chamomiles
poppies and more cornflowers
the eyes and lips of his betrothed
    Â 
    those departing footsteps were they hers
or the steps of a condemned
Brother
    Â 
    the slamming of a door
    Â 
    â€œIch gehe mit dir Bruder
an jenen Ort
und ich höre dein letztes Wort”
    Â 
    are you refusing
to answer my question
I asked him a second and third time

then he raised his eyes to me
again placed his finger
on his lips
    Â 
    stood up and left
    Â 
    followed Christ
emulated Christ
    Â 
    he walked across a field with other
students hungry they picked
ripe ears of corn
husked the grains ate them
from their hands
they husked the grains with their