FROM HOLLAND TO SPAIN Poem by Elke Erb

You see yourself at a distance when you read about Holland. You could be anybody. Whoever reads about Holland is there in spirit. Holland's eminence pushes it into the far distance. Its eminence is composite, one thing connected to another. Naval power, commercial power, sheep breeding, lens grinding. Going from Holland to Spain, however, is almost no sweat at all. Just that trifle, France. Even the Pyrenees are nothing; on the contrary: no sooner named than you've already crossed them. In Spain you buy meat. At the inns you ask for a free bed, a pot, and fire. They are too few, they don't cook for travelers. Everybody brings his own when traveling in Spain. The era is the Baroque. The moon is uninhabited, we are not unreasonable.