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Spiritual
Letters, Series
7, #9
- He'd collapsed from overdoses before; but when we forced our way into his
hotel room, we found him curled up in death, the needle still in his arm.
Only twenty-four, he was someone who'd 'sung a new song, played skilfully'...
one of the most singular and progressive jazz pianists I'd ever encountered.
A young man in a blue shirt and blue cardigan leans out of the third storey
window, looking down to the street, looking for a long time.... A young
couple took it upon themselves to lead the psalm-singing, accompanying
themselves on guitar: a pair of strummers, I quickly concluded. It was
cold, and snow was falling... we hid in the straw. Then we heard shouting,
and we saw that the forest was on fire. I was given an old door to lie down
upon for a bed, little better than the stone floor, in a room full of people
I didn't know: a night without sleep. Ritual washing of feet. Then they ate
unleavened bread, drank wine. A strawberry tree in a field. He told me that
his wife was in hospital, having had a breakdown and been discovered
wandering barefoot and in only a nightgown in the street on a chilly night,
trying to gain entrance to a nearby church. - There's a church I know where
I'll spend Easter, he said, sleeping on a pew, rather than at home in my bed;
I need the solace. - Can you eat this wine, drink this bread? - Only if a
storm or strong winds cut out the lights: then a candle-flame moves here,
moves there. Displaced. ...he was a great fan of the dithyramb; walking at
night through the streets of Vienna, he would suddenly begin to recite
Hšlderlin with a loud and beautiful voice, or even sing one of his
twelve-tone settings. You were arrested and later shot for publishing Hasidic
stories illustrated with your own prints. A door, a room. A man pauses at the
threshold. To sing: tehillim. Suffused with blue: dark blue, and darker.
Spiritual Letters, Series
7, #10
Egyptian blue: a curtain of it, closing. Parsley dipped in salt water; bitter
herbs; matzot; roasted lamb....
the sea
inherits
ink
but which?
blue ink
or black
or red
Black or brunette hair, or blonde? Dusk was falling but it was light, for
the earth was covered in snow. I noticed on his writing-table something like
a rather large envelope, made of black material and decorated with a big
triple cross and the inscription: ÔIn this sign you shall conquer'. - Jewesses pretending
to be French or Italian connive to corrupt the morals of our youth, acting as
whores and governesses and even as teachers; they insinuate themselves into
the lives of those in high office as mistresses, swaying opinion through
their wiles. The executioners run through the streets shooting anyone who
dares leave the house. They shoot anyone who is near the window. The two little girls
hurry along the road, hand in hand, beneath a threatening sky: the clouds are
nothing but viscous smears. There'd been fires, without any doubt: buildings
were burned down. Near some of the burned-out houses there is a strong
smell of dead bodies. When I could get no more sense from him about why he
followed such an odious and dangerous leader, he finally said: His hands are
so beautiful. Children cannot walk on their own strength and are loaded
into wagons. Mothers, looking on, become insane. - When, after the war,
he returned to the university where he'd been rector and a supporter of the
Nazis, a number of the students, including me, wanted to boycott his lecture;
but we were also curious to hear him, so we stood at the back of the hall
with our backs to him.
Spiritual Letters, Series 7, #11
...and O
the
language
inherits
dark
also
Bloodied swathes. Within the straight lines, curves and loops of lead: pieces
of coloured glass. A man lies in a convalescent bed; a nurse standing beside
him; and another man sitting beside her, in a wheelchair. Below us we saw a
squadron of planes, strangely innocent-looking in the afternoon sunlight:
such a pity, I thought, to bomb them. - Long live death! he bellowed to those
in the crowd below. - General, I hate to speak harshly to one who I see is a
cripple; but what you've just said is the most repellent nonsense: you are a
cripple in more ways than one, and you want our society to be a society of
cripples like you.
in darkness
I
dwell
or
is it
undwelling?
When I said I wouldn't listen to her bizarre accusations and got up to leave,
she threw hot coffee in my face. - Stay! she shouted. Orthodoxy is I
myself. Or
for another: I am orthodoxy; orthodoxy is what I am. At college his
ambition was to lead a Communist uprising, but he eventually became a sheep
farmer in the Brecon Beacons. - My friend, an American woman, went to Maoist
China, and it was there that she found herself as a person. - That's
bullshit, you replied. My neighbour is not here, my neighbour is not you. I've passed him on the
street and seen him in the Underground, wearing multi-coloured cardigans; and
once I heard him sing 'You Don't Know What Love Is'.
© David Miller 2015
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