To Pierre Emmanuel
Do you still remember? On the faces.
Do you still remember? The empty ditch.
Do you still remember? Dripping down.
Do you still remember? I’m standing in the sun.
You’re reading a Paris Journal.
It’s been winter since then, winter night.
You’re setting the table beside me,
you’re making the bed in the moon-shine.
Holding your breath while undressing
in the night of the bare house.
Letting down your vest, your clothes.
Your back is a naked gravestone.
Misery-inspired picture.
Is there anyone here?
A wakeful dream:
without any answer I’m crossing the rooms
lying around in the depths of mirrors’ gleam.
So, is this my face, this very face?
Light, silence, judgement are clashing
just like my face, this stone is flying
from the snow-white mirror towards me!
And the horsemen! The horsemen!
Dimness disturbs and lamplight hurts me.
A thin trickle of water is running down
onto the motionless porcelain.
I’m knocking at locked doors.
Your dark room is like a land-mine.
The walls are blazing with chill.
I’m smudging the wall with my cry.
Help me you snow-covered roofs!
It’s night-time. Everything lonely
should shine, before the day of nothing
arrives. Shine you all in vain!
I’m resting my head against the wall.
From all around like snow held in hand
mercy is being offered to me
by a dead city to a dead man.
I did love you! A shout, a sigh,
a cloud trying to escape running.
And at a torrential, heavy trot the horsemen
arrive at the sweltering dawn.
