It takes a while
before it will be over
with room for someone else
For now it is too empty

where you have always been
People soon forget that
when we have a chat
and laugh at something small

Your mother is great
She does what she can do
so without a man
You know the drill

the neighbour mows the lawn
He's really old
time and again he asks
where you have gone

But if I had known it beforehand
I would just as well have been in love
just as well be that woman
still in love with you

While I am musing

the sun hesitates to rise --


and it's getting dark.

While reading I meet

distant people as neighbours –


so intimately.

While talking, we find

in our circular thoughts what --


we already knew.

Not the war makes the warrior
but his peace
with the ending

....My gates are open
....energy is flowing in
....my face shines from it

....I live, I don't distract you
....with golden hair, I am
....life, bald and unadorned

Not: I survive with hope
but with inner peace
with the ending

....I don't leave me
....I don't withdraw
....in pain and sorrow

....I let life flow in and out
....I'm standing in the light
....in which we find each other

I am not here as a sick person
but in my hard-fought peace
with the ending

....My chest breathes up and down
....my dear body hurts
....I radiate it

....With hot water I wash
....off flakes and sighs
....and I stretch out, cautiously

Who and what am I?

In my own eyes, in your eyes?


And in spider eyes?

Whoever never

had that night-black feelings can --


not know my sadness.

Whoever wakes up

here, will wake the butterflies --


sleeping on his cheek.

I peek at my classmates
who I am, and I try it
out on them, because
they don't know me yet

Not as well as Mum
who already knows who I am
and comments on it
which often stops me

from being myself, from doing
as I please, Mum says
rather take example
by your brother or by us

I find it quite a hassle
to find out how
I am, I think I am
constantly changing

Who is a brain boss?

Who balances his thinkles --


and does really know?

Who is a brain boss?

Who balances his thinkles --


and does really know?

Because the whole is whole
completely without nothing
and of course anyway
also all nothing
of the whollyverse

not just the unthinkable
what ever was
before the beginning
of the stars
and what will be
after the existence
of the stars

but also the illusion
of the time
in which we live
and think we know something
of what the whole ignorantly knows

Who of the great saints

has lived up to all of them:


the Ten Commandments?

Who really wants to

do something meaningful, must --


visit old people.

Who's ready to give

his life for you? Your loved one!


who you want to keep.

I am shocked by the question
to myself: who will comfort me?
Where are the arms

that rock me happy
and promise me a bright future?
With whom will I be safe?

.....Come on girl, there is more
.....under the sun, it shines
.....look around you, smell
.....the weather, you have your nose

.....your eyes, ears, and mouth
.....and your hands of course
.....not just for the love
.....of a man, of a child

But the world is so big
I want someone
for myself, a home

where I recharge
I want someone
to embrace, four arms

that feel together
that I am a woman
to love

Why aren't there angels

keeping watch, not even here --


in Los Angeles?

Why aren't there any

pills against amorousness:


Anti-Amorine?

Why are you afraid?

Does it give you the reward --


of fewer hard hits?

Why does it happen,

why does my heart open out --


to love, constantly?

Lately, I've been wondering
Will grandpa Don hug me?
Will grandpa John kiss me on the cheek?
Will my sweetie be the first person
to welcome me there?

Quite often I wonder
Why are the days so similar?
Why do people want to live?
Why are children playing?
How many years did I play?

Then I wonder
which photo will remain of me
How old will I be on it?
Is that what will be left of me?
Will I turn in my grave?

I ponder a lot
about the luck I have had
How rich have I become?
Why are our happiness treasures
our happiness measures?

I often wonder
What will I miss?
Who will miss me?
Who will find me?
And who will have regrets?

Why don't we embrace

each other much more often --


expressing our love?

Why do you do what

I ask? Don't listen to me –


I'm in love with you!

Don't talk about me
you will not succeed anyway
to say who I am

You don't nearly know everything
but you want to experience me
as you know me

No story will fit around it
packing your experience
and hiding it

Don't venture upon labels
you would need even more
than can fit in a book

thick layers on top of each other
an unreadable wall
locking me up

You don't have to explain to anyone
why we are friends
not to yourself either

Rustling lanes, winding roads
the rippling on the bank
of the path along the river

wherever the land is not buried
under city, I walk my days
in the smell of rotting

Mushrooms, spider webs
birds in the undergrowth
and dearest to me are the wild
flowers, thistles, chicory
pink anemones and poppies

I admire the gaunt, the sallow
the beauty under
the beauty of
the scars, the life
they pass on

Like wild geese, fishermen
and monks landed here, others

sailed on and discovered America
but they came back

by the north, Thule
where it rains glowing stones

where the land burns and the rocks
swim between boiling fountains

There are the gates of hell
and the paths to heaven

invisible above the clouds
around huge curtains of ice

They came back to tell
about these wonders, too biblical

to want to keep it secret
from their family and friends

And the new world
they forgot

Wild waves, the shore comes

close, it narrows more and more --


Then, calm, the strait.

Will, after the war,

our hearts still be awaiting --


us at home, sweet home?

Then you want to run away
let me feel for hours
that I'm very, well
as if you are right

You tear yourself loose, always stronger
always lingering at the door
sometimes I get ahead of you
throw me on your williewo

ride Rodeo on your chest
cuddling and massaging
until you give in
and I can present myself

as a mirror
of who you also are
so that we can escape
our loneliness

Will I then remain

a child, showing my parents --


my abilities?

Will it start soon? Or

has it already started?


Is it war right now?

Will life be like that:

a cream cake with trick candles --


filled with dynamite?

Will people ever

love the earth, their mother, more --


than all their vices?

Will this be goodbye,

our happiness a photo --


of a splendid day?

Wind and rain at night,

and I wonder how many --


flowers have fallen.

My son is like me:
when I'm not looking he snakes
through the grass and bushy-tails
up the alder to look out

with wing eyes – he shouts
to the wind where he will go:
far beyond the neighbours
across borders and sunken ships

to the bears of Europe
Bern, Berlin, fool Madrid
Mistress Marseille and the sea
of Seattle, to watch the sun

rise in the large world
outside the wall around our garden
with the squeaky gate
which, opened carefully

gives a ***** of a view

'Happily Ever After'
on The Wall across
my home, Berlin
is my Berlin

Yet I leaf through
a travel magazine, the sea
beckons, the mountains call
echoes Action! Action!

A man smiles at me
We are angels, I give
him my fear, lend
him my room

I need to go, away
from alone, be more
than my work, promise
someone loyalty

Winter evenings at

home, a faint light from outside --


faint sounds blowing by.

The moon goes unseen
beyond the starlight
softly, but so far away
not giving any warmth
another night I feel
another night
the night

another night I feel
alone, like a black moon
a black moon
black moon

on which no one's light is shining
I'm breathing yes and no
whether the sun will shine
in my garden tomorrow morning
whether someone will come
someone will come
someone

who wants to stay with me
The budding flowers
and tense and winterstill
winterstill

Maybe, maybe today
someone will discover
me and all my names
maybe my flowers will open
scenting richly and full
in the gardens
of my heart

With a clean duster,

the maid goes around the house --


waving like a queen.

With a gentle urge

the drums of love are beating --


open all my doors.

With all their long toes,

the trees stand in the floodlight --


of the poppy field.

With dry pods and bags

filled with granules we're rising --


little whirls of wind.

With eyes like a deer,

so wide, the girl is hiding --


in stinging nettle.

With flags of freedom,

you will not occupy peace –


but you do resist.

With her husky voice

she reads to him, full of love –


in the twilight hours.

Within every

story new stories, that's how --


the universe works.

With insight into

human nature you also --


understand yourself.

With my fingertip

I sail deep underwater –


through the distant clouds.

With Nana to the big city
the translation tongues in our ear
'Mignoter et manger, pipi, ****

dodo', we understand everything
that tourists are doing here
'Plain easy, isn't it?'

she sighs, satisfied, licking
a rainbow ice-cream
Tiresome uneasy

I think, all those people
I don't belong to them
'Grandma don't you think so:

grown-ups are actually
quite the same
when you hear them talk

because they already know
everything and I do not and
I think that's a lot more fun'