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| Journal page, late December 1987 |
Dec. 29, 1987, 11:10 p.m.
12°C Momentaufnahmen [Fleeting Impressions]
A dead asp outsprawled before my feet. Dark in the path between the trees of a park without leaves, yet with a converted-water-tower-planetarium. The voice of the trees, the moistened breeze carries meaning to my ears when I slow to walk and tuck the scarf behind my ears. Muffled ears on the edge of my senses.
5 minutes before I heard the "Leiermann" (Hurdy-Gurdy from the Winterreise by Schubert) wet on Dieskau's lips ... "drüben hinterm Dorfe" (over there behind the village) ...
10 minutes before I pivoted, in mid-stride, raced back up the stairs, creak, key-fumble, "Hallo Harris" after tapping at the light switch twice. Switching tones and moods - who am I in this city? Brahms left, Jews carted off to near certain death. The call is from near Grindelallee. The Höhere-Tochter-Schule had to send girls to the Talmud-Tora-Schule to get a Gymnasium degree. My senses are numb to social manners. I want complicated emotional solitude.
I wanted to draw in an untrained scrawl the look of poor girl seeing her mother or father for the last time. As crude as the drawing may be, so, too, would words fall short capturing this moment for me tonight.
