Binding a grave wreath for my grand father and practising the art of losing

25. XII. 1993

For a miracle, take one shepherd’s sheepskin, throw
in a pinch of now, a grain of long ago,
and a handful of tomorrow. Add by eye
a little chunk of space, a piece of sky,

and it will happen. For miracles, gravitating
to earth, know just where people will be waiting,
and eagerly will find the right address
and tenant, even in a wilderness.

Or if you’re leaving home, switch on a new
four-pointed star, then, as you say adieu,
to light a vacant world with steady blaze
and follow you forever with its gaze.


~ Joseph Brodsky (1940-1996)

(-got this amazing poem from Elina for christmas. Fits to everything in my life right now.)

The forgotten words of Alphaville: affection, to cry, autumn light, redbreast.

Look, the trees are turning their own bodies into pillars...

Every year/ everything/ I have ever learned

in my lifetime/ leads back to this: the fires/ and the black river of loss/ whose other side/ is salvation,/whose meaning/ none of us will ever know.

To live in this world/ you must be able/ to do three things:/ to love what is mortal;/ to hold it/ against your bones knowing/ your own life depends on it;/ and, when the time comes to let it go,/ to let it go. ------------------ ------------------- ------------------ ------------------- ------------------ ------------------- ------------------ ------------------- (fragments of Mary Oliver poem "In Blackwater Woods")

(Gollwitzer writes: we are more loved than we realize.)

Winter collage opens today in Berlin: