Berlin, ‘42 Poem by Kevin Kiely

'Libertas Schulze-Boysen b. Paris, Prussian lineage;
aged 29 executed in Plötzensee prison 22.12.1942'

Fish heads, of course to make beautiful soup, was Madeleine's hearty reply.
The recipe from the Reich forty years after, and Francis Stuart limped
in their lovenest, poured Bushmills—healing gilded river water
on the coffee table a copy of Der Spiegel: ‘Schulze-Boysen Straße'
text, photos,8 mm film of the Evil Empire (smuggled out)
anti-Nazi poster campaign, first-time Holocaust truths in print
fleeing, she nearly escaped the Gestapo. But it was easier for me to talk
of Yeats & Shakespeare—Mr Stuart smiled at my youthful remarks.

Excess of love bewildered them. All that delirium of the brave.
Ripeness is all—rhetoric during our lunch.

I have tried to watch one hour with you, Libertas: your sober serious
name of destiny. And where do you look when you cannot face it?

The brazen warrant read out from thin paper, underlined inky type.
A procession at nightfall from the cruciform cellblock towards
the slaughterhouse, like a chapel. Ordered out of your wooden shoes.

Are these manacles, garlands for the life you are giving? Trees flank the prison
and do not speak. There can be no music for this, no Tannhӓuser's
‘March of Pilgrims'.Pinioned, as in a rape by three young thugs
your heart a kettle drum in the stillness of time, the speed of time.

No piano chords for the Cabaret-executioner in black tie, white shirt,
top hat. Mein Leben ist so jung, mir mein junges Leben geben
The staff are paid extra in cigarettes, mopping around
the plug-hole. Jokes about the guillotine, wiped from lips with
the stink of Schnapps in the guardroom.The soup is drowned in whiskey
on my tongue, I cannot feel but mutter what a terrible death.
I will rush out into the sunlight Libertas and fill my pockets with rose petals
And out of your mouth a red, red…