I now almost forget
The pain, the pain, the pain;
Now being lulled by rain,
And smells and warm wings wet.
I swoon into a bed,
Almost forget you're dead,
Almost, almost forget.
Now, now my memories drowse
Amid the whine of bells,
The fumes of rich red smells,
The stupor round my brows.
My nerves and veins are lead.
I swoon into a bed,
Where all my sorrows drowse.
Then suddenly you return,
O marrow of my bone,
Blood flowing through my own!
My pulses yearn and burn.
I battle round my head,
Cry strickenly from my bed.
Suddenly you return!
O God of War and Dearth,
O shattering Blast that blew,
Blood-eyed, blood-fingered, you
Damned God of War and Dearth!
He whom you wrenched from me
To monstrous things and vain,
Burned, broken, buried, he,
He is this smell of earth,
This dead moist smell of rain!
GERMAN BOY
German boy with cold blue eyes,
In the cold and blue moonrise,
I who live and still shall know
Flowers that smell and winds that blow,
I who live to walk again,
Fired the shot that broke your brain.
By your hair all stiff with blood,
By your lips befouled with mud,
By your dreams that shall no more
Leave the nest and sing and soar,
By the children never born
From your body smashed and torn,
—When I too shall stand at last
In the deadland vast,
Shall you heap upon my soul
Agonies of coal?
Shall you bind my throat with cords,
Stab me through with swords?
Or shall you be gentler far
Than a bird or than a star?
Shall you know that I was bound
In the noose that choked you round?
Shall you say, "The way was hid.
Lord, he knew not what he did"?
Shall your eyes that day be mild,
Like the Sacrifice, the Child?
... German boy with cold blue eyes,
In the cold and blue moonrise.