Karen Greenbaum-Maya 127

Gedichte

 

 

The Ballad of the Good Life

Nur wer in Wohlstand lebt, lebt angenehm

Berthold Brecht, from Die Dreigroschenoper

 

We’re told to praise the lives of the ascetics

whose heads are filled with books, but bellies empty.

They live in shacks where rats are energetic.

I gotta say, it really doesn’t tempt me.

The simple life? go, take it if you want.

Can’t call it sacrifice if you’ve no say.

I’ve lived that life. It only left me gaunt.

It wouldn’t keep a baby bird a day.

What use is freedom? You only starve and freeze.

The only good life is a life of ease.

 

Now mind you, I can understand ambition.

From far, the greats are noble, solitary.

But when I got in close to their position,

All I could think was Who’d be legendary?

Does suffering makes you noble? Use your eyes.

If courage brings you fame, there’s also hurt.

You’ve tried out poor and friendless, brave and wise.

So now kick greatness over to the curb.

You’ll see life’s meaning comes down to beer and cheese.

The only good life is a life of ease.

 

 

 

Jardin sous l’eau

 

Pour le jardin sous l’eau 

il a fallu deux ans

pour le mettre en équilibre

et en balance

afin que les cycles 

de l’oxygène, de l’acide carbonique

soutiennent

les poissons comme les plantes

sans flotte d’algue ni puanteur

dans l’eau limpide.

 

The garden in the water

took two years’ tending

to find its equilibrium,

to find the living balance, 

until the cycles

between oxygen and dioxide

sustained both fish and plants

free of rot or rafts of algae

in most limpid water.

 

 

 

35. from Die Heimkehr 

Buch der Lieder, Heinrich Heine

 

I called the Devil. He made haste.

His ill-repute is hard to swallow.

He’s not some ugly twisted beast;

he’s quite a courtly charming fellow.

His word’s his bond, his time is now,

the world goes round and he knows how.

A diplomat, head screwed on straight,

he gets it right with Church and State.

He’s rather pale. It’s no surprise:

Hegel and Sanskrit strain his eyes.

The martial mawkish fop Fouqué’s

his favorite poet, but he’s done meddling

with fame and legacy; he’s settling

lit-crit on his dear Gran, Hecate.

My legal studies drew his praise:

he’d tried his hand in younger days.

My friendship? cost be damned! He vowed

no price too high, at which he bowed.

It seemed to him we’d met before

at the Spanish envoy’s open door?

I looked at him at last, and knew:

My dear old friend! I cried, It’s you.

 

 

 

Lacrimosa

 

Mozart’s Requiem pauses 

mid-spate to take a breath. 

 

A movement set 

for the sorrowing body,

a step that catches 

like words in the throat,

slowed to 

a metronome’s slowest sweep,

 

a fall before 

anything else can begin, 

as we are fallen.

 

The longing 

deep in the chest

deep in the gut. 

This becomes what pulls us on,

 

a dance of laboring steps,

each step leading only 

to the next step.

 

Glissandos heap up, melt,

flow without effort.

Nothing will be come of this, 

nothing will be achieved.

 

Steps that stop when you arrive where you were going:

the low box of the altar

the carved box of the altar

the waiting box the waiting box.

 

Offer the words you will use 

only a few times in your life:

Ich bedauere     I grieve greatly     I am so very sorry

 

 

 

Camellias, Schubert Sonata in A

 

Piano releasing petals onto water

One, and another one

Several, in a shower

The last one, and another one

 

So many notes in one place

some drop out. Others expand until 

many resolves to three

Arpeggio takes a breath, and another breath

 

Variations so slight

you’re not sure:  did they change?

Hurry—listen—stop—don’t miss this

Too quick to be sure --lovely tickle, the question

too slight to seize

too bright to breathe

 

White breath. A red breath

camellia bush covered in little cries

so slight, a breath 

could bruise the petals

 

Such a lovely touch

Someone’s light purposeful fingers

a tickle of pure sweetness

Smooth as camellia petals,

where the ridges of your fingertips

catch even as they glide

More alive than skin

your skin saying stay

knowing even such soft tracks 

will leave a bruise

 

 

 

Karen Greenbaum-Maya is a retired clinical psychologist, former German major, two-time Pushcart and Best of the Net nominee, and, occasional photographer. Her first full sentence was, “Look at the moon!” She has been taken for a native in Munich, Paris, and, Portland (the one in Oregon), but never in SoCal, her actual point of origin. Kattywompus Press publishes her three chapbooks, Burrowing Song, Eggs Satori, and Kafka’s Cat. Kelsay Books publishes her full-length collection, The Book of Knots and their Untying. She co-curates Fourth Sundays, a poetry series in Claremont, California, and is their photographer. For links to work on-line, go to: www.cloudslikemountains.blogspot.com/.

 

Bienvenue au Danse, Karen.