Gedichte lesen

Wer

von einem Gedicht

seine Rettung erwartet

der sollte lieber

lernen

Gedichte zu lesen 

Wer

von einem Gedicht

keine Rettung erwartet

der sollte lieber

lernen

Gedichte zu lesen

(Erich Fried)

Because we spill not only milk 

Knocking it over with an elbow

When we reach to wipe a small face

But also spill seed on soil we thought was fertile but isn't,

And also spill whole lives, and only later see in fading light

How much is gone and we hadn't intended it 

Because we tear not only cloth

Thinking to find a true edge and instead making only a hole

But also tear friendships when we grow

And whole mountainsides because we are so many

And we want to live right where black oaks lived,

Once very quietly and still 

Because we forget not only what we are doing in the kitchen

And have to go back to the room we were in before,

Remember why it was we left

But also forget entire lexicons of joy 

And how we lost ourselves for hours 

Yet all that time were clearly found and held

And also forget the hungry not at our table 

Because we weep not only at jade plants caught in freeze

And precious papers left in rain

But also at legs that no longer walk

Or never did, although from the outside they look like most others

And also weep at words said once as though

They might be rearranged but which

Once loose, refuse to return and we are helpless 

Because we are imperfect and love so

Deeply we will never have enough days,

We need the gift of starting over, beginning 

Again: just this constant good, this

Saving hope.

(Nancy Shaffer)