Love Letter after Else Lasker-Schüler

Weisswurst

Hedwig’s Chapel in the schnee

Hope you all had a lovely Easter. We spent the week in Bavaria, attending the wedding of two of our closest friends in Europe’s (and possibly the world’s) longest castle. It’s always such a privilege to attend a ceremony in a different country, with all its rituals and traditions – the Polterabend, the wedding soup, the Weißwurst breakfast the next day – and it was one of the most romantic, joyous weddings I’ve been to. There was even a carriage pulled by miniature horses, and a burst of the Sound of Music. Here’s the version of an Else Lasker-Schüler poem I mentioned in my last post, an Anglo-German collaboration with our friend Tini, which I was honoured to read in the tiny, medieval Hedwig’s Chapel as snow swirled outside.

Love Letter after Else Lasker-Schüler

For Anna and Rufus

Like a secret spring
murmelt mein Blut
always of you, always of you.

Under the reeling moon
my naked dreams seek you,
like children sleepdancing
softly over dark hedges.

O, your lips are light…
and the intoxication of them…
O blue infloresence, the shimmer –
you smile… you, you,

always, now, this bright trickle
beneath my skin.
Over my shoulder
I listen

as a silent spring listens
and my blood murmurs.
Murmelt mein Blut.

Translated by Clare Pollard and Martina Fuchs