Gerhard Falkner

Barefoot I walk in front of the Deutsche Bank
and speak of the ribbed man—
the ribbed man surprises in the morning
before a plot full of bones
...

my first beloved
is not named laura and not liliana
she doesn't dance and doesn't sleep and isn't alive
she does not resemble god
...

a stranger I awakened and early
the plug still plugged in
a woman, smaller than a horse
handed me an apple in English:
...

you sleep and lie next to your hair
your white leg is propped up
and i, on whom it rests, i am the world
made glum by your sleep, am the danger
...

Aphrodite, at whose command animals couple
her thighs like those of the finest Attic stallions
and dressed in robes as if sprayed with Botticelli
...

Only the breast and quiver reveal the god Apollo
a torso that marble only makes more naked
the arm, fractured like the shaft of a lance
...

Never again has a body come into light
like that which Artemis, rising
from the right into the tumult of battle
...

The hand has been repaired. An arm is missing its shoulder
A knee drives suspended in itself. Everything is
impulse. Even the gaps work
A god comes onstage and, lo
...

Stunning
the way one merges into the other
how there a god persists with the head of a bull
and there an arm−still warm
...

I must have eaten from the spheres
they must have been bitter -
or evil
they had holes that sounded like sighs
...

astonished, had I obeyed her, enough
hardly an answer, of immortals, led safety
what times these are wherever you look, but talk
as fate throws over, it comes here
cut short, embraced moment, from within
...

I desired, blind breath, as of hope
the most fervent picture will be of this, our wandering
so different, so heaped unto summer
who at that time, no lounger finds rest, but the manner
goes on to the next, to the text, in nerves finer
...

whoever sees me
the way I throw fish
about me
with what a strong
...

who am I or ask, since he left, there remained
no consolation in early nature, and snatched
from us all rest, a spark of air, he replied
...

Year after year, if memory serves me well,
shortly before sunset we would fall under
that spell
our thoughts, like gleaming arrows,
...

"Sigh!" - if only I could sigh
without having to mean the sigh
that curls up before this sigh
...

whom do you think i saw yesterday? me!
yes but i was not alone
who do you think was with me? the very same!
not an inch taller than i
...

to be alone, but all pleasure, don´t tell anyone
I gave it a name then and the dwindling, but she
to the utmost, I felt a lack, brought on
...

allein sein, aber alle lust, sage das keinem
nannte ich dann und das schwindende, doch sic
zum äußersten, ich fühlte ein fehlen, gebracht
braucht keine zeit oder höhe, wer erträgt es
um heimirrung fragend, nicht, daß es endet
...

Ich muß von den Kugeln gegessen haben
die müssen bitter gewesen sein
oder böse
sie hatten Löcher, die klangen wie Klagen
sie rollten dunkel
durch Mark und Bein
ich bin von den Tagen abgesessen
mir drehte sich alles
so hab ich gerauscht
die Löcher starrten wie blindes Vergessen
ich habe umsonst hineingelauscht
...