Alfred Lichtenstein

It's enough to make me throw the chair through the panes of the mirror Into the street - There I sit with raised eyebrows:

I am the Division Commander, His Excellency. I have attained what is humanly possible.

Those were fine times, when I still Walked in silk socks and wore underpants, Sometimes had ten marks to spare, in order

It's certainly late.    I must earn something. But they're all going right by today with smug expressions on their faces. They don't want to give me a single good-luck penny.

In the sky the howitzers no longer explode, The cannoneers rest next to their guns. The infantry pitch tents now,

Night creeps into the cellars, musty and dull. Tuxedos totter through the rubble of the street. Faces are moldy and worn out.

I can no longer find a place for my eyes. I cannot hold my legs together. My heart is hollow.    My head is going to burst.

Yesterday I still went powdered and addicted Into the many-colored sounding world. Today everything has long since drowned.

A frozen moon stands waxen, White shadows, Dead face,

Here is the way I shall die: It's dark.    And it has rained. But you can no longer detect the imprint of the clouds

A fog has destroyed the world so gently. Bloodless trees dissolve in smoke. And shadows hover where shrieks are heard.

The sky is swollen with tears and melancholy. Only far off, where its foul vapors burst, Green glow pours down.    The houses,

Paul said: Ah, but who wouldn't want to drive a car forever - We burrow our way through high-stemmed woods,

The street looks like eternal Sunday. Lightly summerhouse rests against summerhouse. Chauffeurs wheel by grandly.

Houses stand stiffly next to their fences. Let your eyes, last sparrows, flutter. Bluebottles alight on your face.

Drunk, Lene Levi walked In the neighboring streets nightly Back and forth, screaming, "auto."

(Shortly before departing for the theater of war) for Peter Scher Before dying I am making my poem.

It sure was fine to be a soldier for a year. But it is finer to feel free again. There was enough of depravity and pain

They cannot stand their rooms in the evening. They creep out into deep starry streets. How gentle is the world in the streetlights' wind!

Evening comes with moonshine and silky darkness. The roads become weary.    The narrow world widens. Winds of opium move in and out of the field.

I stand this way on cloudy winter days From dawn to dusk and I soap heads, Shave them and powder them and speak

Many sick people are walking in the garden Back and forth and lying in the porches. Those who are the sickest burn with fever

A large space - half dark... deadly... completely confused... Provocative!... delicate... dream-like... recesses, heavy doors And broad shadows, which lead to blue corners...

Out of crooked clouds priceless things grow. Very tiny things suddenly become important. The sky is green and opaque

Decline already - But that was quick... Hardly a trace of rising -

First Song: So many years I sought you, Mary - In gardens, rooms, cities and mountains,

Every day, when it gets so very dark That I can read no more, I walk along the street singing,

Like old bones in the pot Of noon the damned streets lie there. It's a long time since I saw you here.

(for a picture) With all its branches a slender tree casts The shine of darkness around poor crosses.

The air is gray.    Who knows something good for soot? Next to an ox grazing on the ground Stands an astonished deeply serious mountaineer.

City and beloved are far behind. I am so betrayed and alone. Slowly I move from one

Your eyes are bright lands. Your looks are little birds, Handkerchiefs gently waving goodbye.

The heat sticks closely to the gun and to the hand. It pricks the eyes.    Nothing remained forgotten. The troops stepped, half drunk, into the fire.

The yellow mother's eye burns up there. Everywhere night lies like a blue cloth. There is no question that I am sucking air.

...    And all the streets lie smooth and shining there. Only occasionally does a solid citizen hurry along them. A swell girl argues violently with Papa.

Half hands hold my fate. Where will it sink... My steps are tiny, like those of a woman.

Now of course I put on my straw hat. Rain has washed the evening blue. How the world glows!    I look up piously,

You don't love me...    I have never appealed to you... Was never your type... And my hard eyes annoy you, my darling...

In weary circles a sick fish hovers In a pond surrounded by grass. A tree leans against the sky - burned and bent.

The deserted streets flow in gleaming light Through my dull head.    And hurt me. I clearly feel that I shall soon slip away -

The troops are singing fervently, each for himself: God, protect me from misfortune, Father, Son and Holy Spirit,

I go through the days Like a thief. And no one hears

Some day - I have signs - a mortal storm Is coming from the far north. Everywhere is the smell of corpses.

The day is ruined.    The sky is drunk. Like false pearls, little stumps Of chopped up light lie around and reveal

Without horror you devour dead flesh every day. And dead blood is a sweet syrup for you. Aren't you afraid? -

In my youth the world was a small pond, Grandma and red roof, lowing Of oxen and a clump of trees.

Thousands of stars twinkle in the gentle sky. The landscape glows.    From the distant meadow Mute marching men slowly come closer.

The fat man thought: In the evening I gladly walk in rubbers, But also when the streets are clean and spotless.

The hour moves forward. The mole moves out. The moon emerges furiously.

Lene Levi went out in the evening, Mincing, her skirt bunched up, Through the long, empty streets

1 It's good and beautiful to be a soldier for a year. You live longer that way.    And one is certainly pleased

The folds of the sea crash like whips on my skin. And the stars of the sea tear me apart. The evening of the sea is one of screaming wounds for the lonely,

1 O you Berlin, you colorful stone, you beast. You cast me with street lamps like briars.

A certain Rudolf called out: I have eaten too much. Whether it's healthy is very questionable.

All men are now greedy, All women are shouting, Hide yourself in your hump,

All things are seamless, As though forgotten, light and dull. From the sacred heights the green sky spills

The sky is like a blue jellyfish. And all around are fields, rolling meadows - Peaceful world, you great mousetrap,

Packs of houses squat along rotten streets, Around whose hump a gray sun shines. A perfumed, half crazy little poodle

A man walked back and forth in his torn slippers In the small room He inhabited.

The earth grows moldy in fog. The evening is as oppressive as lead. Electric sparks crackle and whimper all around,

The sweaty heads of waiters tower above the room Like lofty and powerful capitals. Lice-ridden boys giggle nastily.

A white bird is the big sky. Under it a cowering city stares. The houses are half-dead old people.

The naked seats hearken strangely Alarming and quiet, as though there were some danger. Only some are covered with a person.

One must guard oneself ever so carefully against Howling, without any reason, like an animal. Against pouring beer over the faces of all the waiters,

Like a white fungus, a lump of wind covers The green corpse of the lost world. Frozen rivers form an iron dam

(Dedicated to Kurt Lubasch, July 15, 1912) You, I can endure these stolid Rooms and barren streets

First a bright, brief drum roll, A bang and explosion into the blue day. Then a noise, like rockets climbing on

Sleepy policemen waddle under streetlights. Broken beggars grumble when they sense people. On some corners powerful streetcars stutter.

In the sunlight doctors tear a woman apart. Here the open red body gapes.    And heavy blood Flows, dark wine, into a white bowl.    One sees

The poet thought: ah, I have enough trash! The whores, the theater, and the moon in the city, The dress-shirts, the streets, and smells,

No, I have no capacity for life. I could be considered foolish - Today I am not going to the restaurant.

Evening and grief and lamp light Bury our death-face. We sit at the window and drop out of it,

Mother, don't hold me, Mother, your caress hurts me, See through my face,

White, I lie On the remains of an amusement park Between jagged buildings -

Fat trains go down loud tracks Past houses, which are like coffins. On the corners wheelbarrows with bananas squat.

A little girl crouches with her little brother Next to an overturned barrel of water. In rags, a beast of a person lies gulping food

A totally perverse Turk bought for himself, Out of grief for the recent death Of plump Fatme, his favorite wife,

(Dedicated to a clown) Many days tread upon human animals, In gentle oceans hunger-sharks fly.

(Dedicated to L.L.) Walls separate us. Strange spider webs.

I gladly left The noisy death of the city, With its thousands of leering faces,

What do I care about the swift newspaper boys. The approach of the late auto-beasts does not frighten me. I rest on my moving legs.

A fat young man plays with a pond. The wind has caught itself in a tree. The pale sky seems to be rumpled,

Kuno Kohn sings: Dusty Sunday Lies burned to pieces.

I would like to lie in my bed In a white shirt, Wished the beard was gone,

A dog shrieks in misery from a bridge To heaven... which stands like old gray stone Upon far-off houses.    And, like a rope

Behind yellow windows shadows drink hot tea. Yearning people sway on a hardened pond Workers find a soft woman's corpse.