The dome of Isfahan / compassion for the Chinese soldiers.
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Freundschaft, Liebe, Kirch und Heilge, Kreuze, Bilder.
Altar und Kanzel und Musik. Es tönet ihm die Predigt.
Die Kinderlehre scheint nach Tisch einschlummernd müßig
Gespräch für Mann und Kind und Jungfraun, fromme Frauen;
Hernach geht er, der Herr, der Burgersmann und Künstler.
Auf Feldern froh umher und heimatlichen Auen,
Die Jugend geht betrachtend auch.
(Friedrich Hölderlin)
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The dome of the mosque of Isfahan does not force us to direct our eyes to a specific point or direction, it stands before us as a whole.One can regard it as a whole, as a unity, one can lose oneself in the shimmering turquoise of the tiles, can follow the forms of the ornaments or attempt to read the text. One asks oneselve whether it is writing or ornament that floats above the bluish turquoise green. That on which all is built, – the text of the Koran – is the hardest thing to recognize, the characters are too stretched, too large or too flourished, too small to be read easily – nevertheless they are always there.Like sound which is always on the one hand at the boundary between audible and no longer audible, and on the other hand at the boundary between noise and tone; the spoken is always at the boundary between text and ornament, between language and sound. The topic is the line where concrete text becomes sound of language. Everything is neither of them and simultaneously both.After the failing of communism, the ideological concepts were removed from politics in the „west“ and the „ideology“ of free enterprise began to show itself unveiled as boundless egoism and opportunism with the aim of total consuming. The new law is that of the fittest, the new leaders are the managers. Solidarity was replaced by a competition with extremely unequal initial conditions. A kind of caste-system developed on earth: 1. World, 2. World, 3. World…The sun makes his way imperceptibly slowly, the light changes during his way and with the light the dome. Does the dome remain the same or does it change? Both simultaneously: It remains the same and it changes. Time passes by and stops, what we perceive is a stretched moment.
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Inventur
Dies ist meine Mütze,
dies ist mein Mantel,
hier mein Rasierzeug
im Beutel aus Leinen.
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Konservenbüchse:
Mein Teller, mein Becher,
ich hab in das Weißblech
den Namen geritzt.
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Geritzt hier mit diesem
kostbaren Nagel,
den vor begehrlichen
Augen ich berge.
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Im Brotbeutel sind
ein paar wollene Socken
und einiges, was ich
niemand verrate,
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so dient es als Kissen
nachts meinem Kopf.
Die Pappe hier liegt
zwischen mir und der Erde.
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Die Bleistiftmine
lieb ich am meisten:
Tags schreibt sie Verse,
die nachts ich erdacht.
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Dies ist mein Notizbuch,
dies meine Zeltbahn,
dies ist mein Handtuch,
dies ist mein Zwirn.
(Günther Eich)
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Passing these caste-boundaries is almost impossible, every attempt is life-threatening: In Berlin where I live it is already almost a normality to hear that a foreigner was beaten up by Neonazis; in Austria where I come from this is accomplished by the police. The value of a person, of every living being and of things, became their output measured in money. Everything must serve a purpose. Value degenerated to usability.
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Radwechsel
Ich sitze am Straßenhang.
Der Fahrer wechselt das Rad.
Ich bin nicht gern, wo ich herkomme.
Ich bin nicht gern, wo ich hinfahre.
Warum sehe ich den Radwechsel
mit Ungeduld?
(Bertolt Brecht)
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A Haiku represents directly, it is too close to the object to explain it. The poem becomes the thing which it describes. We are in a forced manner a little consider what only by itself even be, something the more to nothing refer. Mankind lives from those who are not useful, those who thought about the question of how many angels could stand on a needlepoint or how to design a dome. Everything essential is without purpose and results from emptiness.Not without reason the inner sanctum under the dome is an empty space.
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Margaret has a milking-pail,
And she rises early;
Thomas has a threshing-flail,
Sometimes crossing through the grass
Where the dew lies pearly,
They say ‚Good-morrow‘ as they pass
By the leafy limes.
(Christina Rosetti)
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A Tibetan Lama said that it became really difficult for him only then when he felt he was in danger of losing compassion for the Chinese soldiers who were torturing him.The republican canditate for presidency George Bush Jr. is famous for never having signed an appeal for mercy during his term as a governor. He had all 190 persons sentenced to death, murdered by the state – the last of which was a 62 years old lady.
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PS:“ ök“ reminds me of the swedish word „öken“. And it means – funny enough – „desert“! Did you know that? (From a letter to me.)