The details are blurred

I am watching your struggles to become one with your self and your others. Opening an office in your garden, which is sealed off now, no more consultation hours. Why did you open it? Just to demonstrate your right to shut it down? How can I take it seriously now? Aren‘t we fooling ourselves? Aren‘t faked tears also a form of violence? Going through shit now doesn‘t mean we will be spared from it later. What are we trying to prove with our suffering? This time there‘s no culprit. There‘s only a complainer.

I am sleepless because suddenly thoughts sicker through the walls of my building. Beforehand I didn‘t even know that I had walls let alone a building. Now, after it got distinctively pointed out: what should I do with it, the walls, the thoughts, the building? Should I call it home or merely a house in a row of houses, in a colony, estate, settlement, maybe a neighbourhood? Take it for real, discernable, or dismiss it as one more illusion, fake news spreading confusion, a fungus eating my mind, my sanity. Every neighbourhood has its very own intricacies. A voice in my head trying hard to smart me out, keeps telling me that things only have the meaning we attach to it. Then, how real is your existence, mine? When I recall you, I recall your voice and the way you threw it into fire, my name and the idea of something I had misunderstood.

I remember looking at a piece of polished wood. The details are blurred. Lines adding up and turning into patterns. I remember a struggle to be close, soft advances in a battle with the need to stay on top of the game. I gave you my time as well, subjugated my will, made you my friend, you threw it all into the gutter. Our relation became the meaning you attached to it, existence inside a huge void spiraling down, turning me into nothing but dirt and spit, basic elements the entire world is made of. I crumbled, sensed a giant tremble, an earthquake bringing down an ancient place of worship. It took me months to recompose myself. These are forces no one can revolt, and still we try, because we are human and believe it is better to lose a struggle than to remain idle or dead. Remaining idle is an art in itself. Remaining dead the bigger part of the picture.

ganz anders

gestört von worten
bin ich
gestolpert
aus einem erinnerungstief

einst ganz nah
in meine wiederholungsschleife

geflüstert
in die mulde im kopf, an der

sich gefühle entzünden und reiben

mich, auf und ab und auf, nicht

marionette aber fast, am faden

seidend, geführt
durch einen witz

nur keiner lacht, ganz ohne jojo 

war das nicht ganz ohne 

dich wäre ich ich

ganz (nicht kaputt)
anders (greifbar)

denken wir

wir leben, als wäre nichts gewesen

die generation dazwischen überspringt

eine unregelmäßige rille im muster

des sonst gutbürgerlich angelegten steigs

nach vorn denken wir nicht weiter darüber

und hinaus und wundern uns später

über wunde punkte in schiefertafeln, die längst

dem whiteboard platz machen, überholt

und entsorgt, einschusslochartige bildungslücken

im schädel knackt es, wir entschuldigen uns

vom unterricht, stühle ran, licht aus, fenster zu

nach Haus, da ist es sicher, macht ignoranz nichts

aus
denken wir

The dogs are sharp

I watched a girl locked into a watchful house

biting fingernails, nailpolish

serving as colourful garnish

I watched her lift a weapon, clumsily

and shoot herself in the mirror

directly into the head

the town beyond reach

there is no entertainment here

all there is is watching

watching out and fear

I watched her sitting next to the bed of a blind grandfather, now

a man of delusions, staring into bitterness
he can go nowhere but

there is a sense of duty here: a tear

feeding a forbidden lake just around the corner
completely out of reach

Its surface a mirror of long gone memories

a long gone father

a long gone childhood

boat rides and fishing adventures

there was the sound of laughter
above the surface of this mystic water

an existence the girl once called her life

without questioning, now she wouldn‘t dare

to find a name for it or claim any possessions:

Worn out sweaters, worn out memories

dreams, worn out and sucked into years

of running around the same old walls of the same old house
What to own in a disowned, stolen life?

The dogs are sharp

the dogs keep barking

at elders who don’t have solutions

for little girls with dreams

for fathers consumed by struggles

for mothers consumed by worries

for grandmothers consumed by songs of

a long gone life at the foot of snow-covered mountains

Everything has rules
that might change over time

The dogs keep barking

they have a good nose
for men without honour

for culprits and the sweat of guilt and fear

She will meet him

one day

he will be not the same

the future was just one step

ahead of a moment

in which everything changed

He changed without warning

they locked him up

she still calls him brother

not the same

no words left for

his face, his heart, his games

not the same

They might come to shoot her

they might come

they might

come and go with me to london

I will give you my house, my bed

a marginal sense of shelter
promises

I watched her arguing with an elder sister

escaping from suitors who might be her only escape

I watched her riding

a smile, a bicycle, on the same spot

again and again around that old tree

whose seed once fell

into the lap of a field

that now is called a yard

uncared for

there seems to be no need
to care
for slow things when all one eats
has the same old taste, restless

Something grows into years of waiting

between her shoulders, her blades

a tiny drop of water, a wanting

a seed was planted there

by her nightmare’s elder brother: revenge

has a face, has a name

he might come to shoot her

he might come

he might

She will have to face him

long after her escape

she will have to face him opening the fire

blowing her head off

in the mirror frame

she will face her buried, churning fear
her nightmare's restless brother