N 6 o
imprint
SAND
Christina Wegener
03
Editor’s Note
preface
02
Editor-in-Chief
Designer
A birthday party in a blossoming garden with a big cake and lots of friends
Christina Wegener
Lucas Liccini
from school. A weekend on the Baltic Sea with an older brother and a few cousins. A hiking trip to the Alps with my father. All memories I wish I had,
Managing Editor
Administrative Manager
memories which others may have told me, memories that sneak up on me
Lyz Pfister
Catherine Plaut
from time to time and almost feel like my own. I don’t mind. They are nice.
Poetry Editor
Distribution Manager & Events
Julian Smith-Newman
Jane Flett
Fiction Editor
Media Manager & Events
Florian Duijsens
Asoka Esuruoso
Art Editor
Contributing Editor
both, “rough when it whips at your bare legs, but soft when you lie in it,” as
Yvonne Andreas
Danielle Janess
Erin Kelly puts it in “Leave Him with Me,” the story that opens this issue.
I might feel differently, however, about adding less sunny ones to the mix, such as those that surface in this issue of SAND. Some stories read like memories I am glad are not mine. Some are disturbing and pervasive as they reveal family estrangements and unsettling relationships between parents and children, as we witness life and death and the state in between. But not all of SAND #6 is like this, don’t worry. Remember that sand can be
This is what we like about SAND. Besides the Lee Hazlewood song, of course. Copy Editor
Founder & Fairy Godmother
Alex Bodine
Becky Crook
We are very excited about this issue and hope you will be too. It’s also exciting to know that everybody’s reading experience will be unique. You too will add your own layer of memories — true or false — to the words and images that compose this issue — and to the singular photography inserted
ISSN 2191-429X Published in Berlin Copyright Autumn 2012 Printing: Solid Earth Printed on Bilderdruck 115g
SAND Journal Manteuffelstr. 44 10999 Berlin info@sandjournal.com www.sandjournal.com
Typeface: Hellschreiber Sans created by Jörg Schmitt Foundry: Gestalten Fonts
Connect with us on Facebook for news and events: www.facebook.com/sandjournal
into the last page of each copy, a lost or maybe rejected memory on the back of which yet another memory is shared with you. A happy one? One you actually might like to adopt? We don’t know... We would like to thank all of our readers, our contributors, and everybody who has supported SAND since its launch in May 2010. But most of all we would like to thank the founder of this journal, Becky Crook, a truly amazing person we will miss a lot when she leaves Berlin this year. Without her, SAND would have never become this beautiful publication.
05
04
table of
Contents
52
Shave
58
Flügelschuh
Erin Kelly
60
Wingshoe
David Boffa Norbert Lange translated by Julian Smith-Newman
06
Leave Him with Me
12
Your Best Face Versus Tigers
Joseph Goosey
62
There Goes A Narwhal
13
Essentially Empty
Katie Eberhart
69
Phänomenologie mit einigen Geist
16
traces
Catherine Hales 72
Ekphrasis for Oppen
17
constant drive mechanism
Catherine Hales 76
The Correction
18
Mensajes
Alejandro Zambra 85
to look / out where yr going
20
Messages
translated by Elisabeth Fisherkeller
23
Beatriz
Sharif El Gammal-Ortiz
Kaffee Pause
Sophia Moseley
40
Prospects
51
very small drawing
David Nee
57
bonding fallen fruits
Utz Rachowski
68
Who knows
translated by Michael Ritterson
74
Girl
Leif Haven
98
These Memories Are Not Your Own
Kenneth Pobo
44
Questions of Travel: A Review of Shane Anderson’s Études des Gottnarrenmaschinen
how to buy a goddamn big car:
Artwork
untitled
Hot Air Balloon
50
Leif Haven
22
43
Kreuzberg/Calvary
William Black
Sophia Moseley
Kenneth Pobo
49
Jennifer Nelson
vacant
Aunt Gwen’s Secretions
Kreuzberg
Steven Johannes Fowler & Monika Rinck
15
42
48
Emily Lundin
Piia Rossi Antoni Sieczkowski Claudia Olendrowicz Hanna Fiegenbaum Alexander Adams Becky Crook
06
07
fiction
Erin Kelly
Leave Him with Me
paving stones to the front door, open. Then they will both turn into their bedrooms and Dad will fall asleep with his boots on. The small boy will creep into the room, see his Mum’s sleeping face turned towards the door, and undo the thick, worm shoelaces. He will be too scared of waking Dad to take
The sea air rages at the small boy’s face, feels deep into his clothes for
the boots off. He will watch from the doorway the heave of his huge chest
the pocket of warmth under his arm. The rope cuts a zig-zag into his puffy
and the two caves in his nose. He will wait there for a little while then slowly
jacket. Slow tears squish out at the sides of his eyes, a snail trail down his
shuffle across the hallway to his room. The silence always makes him sleep.
face that sparkles a little under the orange streetlight. There is a raucous heartbeat jumping from the small boy as he watches the waves chewing at
Won’t be long now, he thinks, ‘til his Dad comes out and unties him. Lets him stretch his arms, asks him if he got enough fresh air.
the beach nearby. The street is empty and it’s only lonely, barking dogs left with him. The rope is holding him at the elbows. The view is stop-start with lamp post, beach, car park, beach, and the low scrub floats and dips with the slick
The small boy stands in the doorway of the kitchen watching his mum cut
air. He sees a little light way out to sea, blinking at him. He tries to blink
the onions. She wipes the little tears away with the back of her hand causing
when it does but can’t tell if it works. A beacon or a boat, something floats
the swooping silver knife to fish-flash around her head. They eat dinner while the sun is still out and there is no sign of
out there. The small boy doesn’t like boats. He likes sand. He learnt at school
Dad. After dinner the small boy asks if he can go down to the beach.
that it was made up of crushed shells, so now he stoops over the small
He wanders down through the streets, yapping back at the little
particles looking at the thousands of colours and wonders how they got so
dogs along the way, and counts the houses he has been into on one hand. He
pulverised. It’s rough when it whips at your bare legs, but soft when you lie
squats in the sand and sticks little twigs in a circle. The brash sea air eats at
in it. He would like a house made of sand, to run his hands along the walls and
his hair and spits redness onto his cheeks. The stepping of time across the
feel the soft shapely stuff under his fingers.
sky begins to pucker the blue with dark grey. The little sticks gather piles
The pole digs into his spine. When he tilts his head it disappears into the swooping, starry sky. The door to the pub opens and out walks the
of sand beside them as the wind picks up. He doesn’t go near the sea, not in this darkness.
smell of stale beer. He isn’t disappointed when it isn’t his Dad. The small boy
Dad is not there when he gets in. Quick ruffle and a pick peck on
feels happy right then. His Dad will be coming out soon with shaking legs
the cheek from Mum, then to bed where his heart rate grows and grows until
and a flu-like red face. He might even hold the small boy’s hand when they
he hears the car in the drive, the heavy footsteps, the scrape of the back
walk home.
door and the feel of his Dad walking into the house.
There will be the slow five-minute walk with the rope dangling
The next day he takes the same walk but this time there is
from Dad’s shoulders and the slight listing of his hair to one side, the silent
someone running in front of him. A dash of burnt hair that rushes down to
streets shrouded with heavy casuarina trees and the careful steps up the
the beach. He stretches his calves into a run and his arms flap and hang
09
08
like tentacles beside him. The redhead is racing down the sand hills sending
The small boy is in the shed before school, before Mum and Dad
cascades of icing sugar after his fast feet. The small boy catches him at the
are even awake; Dad on the couch and Mum has closed the bedroom door.
end of the pier. They watch each other’s rib cages bursting for air. Nothing
The shed is dusty and full of spiky objects, empty cans of paint and nails
is said, just the quick eyeing of runners and scrapes on elbows. The redhead
scattered everywhere. He climbs in among the cobwebs to wrestle a tangled
walks to one end of the pier and peers over the edge at the jelly-blue water.
line from a pile of sinkers. He doesn’t know what else he needs but he packs
The small boy wonders whether or not to follow him and then does. To watch
the fishing line into his backpack.
the slow waving of kelp stuck to the pylons.
Running down the road to the beach barefoot on the asphalt
They fall into step with one another. Quick-paced to the corner
burning holes in the bottoms of their feet, the liquid horizon is glimmering
store after school to share a Calippo and dawdle home. They don’t know
in front of them. They run to the edge of the pier and splay their legs wide
what secrets are so don’t share them. He doesn’t know where the redhead
over the edge. The lines disappear sneakily into the water and they watch
comes from. The small boy turns off into his street first but keeps watch
them keenly for a little bob, a tug, something. The wind starts pestering
while the redhead walks into the twilight.
the people on the beach and picks up the lines, hauls them out of the water and sends them flapping in all directions. There are no weights on them and the two small boys feel foolish but laugh and punch red patches into each other’s arms. They don’t say much on the walk home. The redhead walks
Heat and time, these things are falling shadows behind them as they run,
ahead, kicking stones and waving when the small boy turns to go. The small
the small boy behind the redhead, down to their spot on the pier. The planks
boy smiles and clutches the shiny fishing line tighter in his hands, making
are faded, hollowed out and covered in squid ink. One night on the walk home
criss-cross patterns on his skin.
from the pub, with the thick rope that reminds the boy of camels dragging
The small boy reaches the front garden, skips up the paving
behind him, he asks his father if he can borrow some fishing line from the
stones to the front door, lets it slap behind him. He is halfway through a
shed. He would like to try and catch a crab. Dad says it’s okay and he can look
loud hello when he hears the voices, sharp, hurting. The small boy walks in
for some line in the shed tomorrow.
and flushes red, they are talking about him. He wants to say that he doesn’t
Mum is in the kitchen when they get home. She looks cold in her
care. But this is for the adults. He shifts and wiggles until he is unnoticed
nightie standing at the sink. Her hands are under the hot water tap. The
and in the kitchen. The arguing goes on and nothing will stop it. He puts his
small boy sees the steam rushing out of the open window. He walks slowly
finger into the Nutella jar and feels down to the bottom.
down the hallway to his bedroom. The voices are low. He hears the tap stop and his Dad’s heavy boots stop. He wonders if they will leave each other. That is what happens. The small boy knows. He can’t sleep from the shouting. His head is heavy, thinking heavy thoughts, and then light again as he thinks
They are in the shed, both of them, looking for sinkers. They start playing
about the spaceships silently orbiting above him. He can’t remember the
one of their games, Mums and Dads. They have played it before. But this
difference between a spaceship and a satellite. Which one is real, he thinks.
time it is dark and musty and they have fat goose feather jackets on. The
11
10
small boy tells the redhead to lie in the corner. He storms in, having had a
The small boy stands with his back bending around the pole while
long day. He lies on top of the redhead and they stare at each other full in
happy noises from the pub clatter out to meet his ears. He stands there
the face. They start moving up and down and before long they are red in the
thinking of tomorrow, of the cold day when the redhead and him will crawl up
cheeks with nostrils flared and full of dust. There is a hot feeling in the small
the sand dunes and then roll down until every single centimetre of their skin
boy’s pants, some feeling he can’t quite get to. It is elusive and unknown. He
is covered with sand. Everywhere. He will have to have a bath when he gets
keeps wiggling. He hears Mum shout out teatime and they stop momentarily,
home because Mum will yell if she finds puddles of sand all over his room
breathless and feeling inexplicably bad. Then they keep going and the heat
again. Yell like she sometimes yells at Dad, scary yelling, her face turning
intensifies to some unobtainable point. It doesn’t make sense this lovely
into someone he doesn’t know. The small boy and the redhead will run over
feeling, this sweet hot squishing together. They don’t know where they are
and around every dune they can reach. They might clumsily tie a sinker onto
headed, but they have no time, so they stop. They sit up.
the fishing line and pull in piles of kelp. Then they will go home and lie in the shed together, wrapped in their huge jackets, and get hot in the face. They will never end, the days like this, they never will. The small boy knows that. He knows that with a certainty which also tells him that his Dad will leave the
Alone in his bedroom, the small boy looks down at his potbelly. Watching
pub eventually, his fingers will be wet with beer and cold glasses, and he will
it breathe in and out. The house around him is shuffling with the sound of
un-tie the small boy again. Some things in life are certain for everyone, he
possums and groaning with the movements of Mum and Dad, avoiding each
thinks.
other, not talking. He has one hand on his belly feeling the tiny beat in there when Dad walks in with his coat on. He is a tower of raspy hair and eyes that skirt around the small boy. He nods with a jerky movement, towards the door, and the small boy knows, reaches over for his Rossi boots and wriggles them over his fat socks. Dad walks out and the fly screen bangs behind him in the empty night air. The small boy runs through yelling bye to Mum and lets the screen bang behind him too. There is a crackle of cold air snapping at his cheeks. His Dad is standing at the gate looking up at the spectacular night sky falling heavy with stars. The small boy would like to ask what he is looking at but he knows his Dad will think that is a stupid question. Because he is looking at the stars and that is obvious. The small boy knows it is not that obvious. What is he thinking while he is looking? What bits does he look at more? The questions will never be asked and never be answered. He will have to learn to guess. They walk along the streets and keep looking up at the sky. His Dad says, “It’s cold tonight.”
12
Joseph Goosey
Katie Eberhart
13
poetry
Your Best Face Versus Tigers
Essentially Empty
poetry
There are certain moments accompanied by the idea
Consider a vessel-less life—containers
the narrator may no longer continue.
all holey like popped balloons or
He’s simply got to locate the nearest ocean and drown.
glass jars reduced to silica and sand.
If the narrator were not a narrator this would be simple.
I live (admittedly less and less) with glass
All cardinal directions contain oceans.
bottles or flasks, pitchers and basins.
This is taught early in the American education system and most likely all others.
Fragments of glass are shards, splinters, splines—
But for a narrator the compass is ill.
ground fine and fused into asphalt
Morality and vision are not exclusive.
primordial black-tar-macadam rolled flat
Morality and vision are not. However lost,
and not a vessel. We dither. Our pavements
a narrator deserves at least the very best of sandwiches.
a lacing. The ground disappears. A bug eats a hole
A narrator eats boats with teeth of poor quality. The Titanic must be preserved in the imagination,
in a leaf. I saw this today, sitting on the barn roof—
the corpses go bye.
cottonwood leaves, yellow and as big as my hand, falling around me, twisting like butterfly wings, missives rattling like a bag of bones. One yellow leaf, not even skeleton veins remained
only a matterless ovoid, as if mechanically stamped, the leaf-skin chewed swallowed digested. No one will know
14
there is no barbed wire in the forest surrounding the barn, of that I am certain. We bring our own danger. Today it was steel— knives and the blade-edge of flashing. Unrolling
roofing. Cutting and nailing a whole not parts—asphalt and tar, pebbles and sand— an old formula like glass.
vacant, Sophia Moseley
Who tinkers with the recipe for glass?
42
Kenneth Pobo
Kenneth Pobo
43
fiction
Aunt Gwen’s Secretions
Hot Air Balloon
fiction
We invite her over once a year; a day we dread. On the glider she talks about my other aunts, all three of them failures, even Aunt Wag who invented silent flush birthday candles. She doesn’t say what she thinks of us, but she sighs, shakes her head, and looks away.
A bizarre goo that smells like iodine floats out of her pores. I say nothing, just get her summer sausage on a Ritz cracker that she eats in one bite, the floor getting sticky.
At their meeting, the English faculty feeds each other poison strawberries. They get sick, blame each other, but come in the next day. After graduation, they all get in a hot air balloon, drift over farm country. Tractors look up, wave. They laugh and remember old times until someone mentions Milton, and soon they’re slapping faces. Hard. One by one they kill each other. The balloon dude tosses bruised bodies in one unmarked grave. Their sad books wail. Their theories cower.
50
Leif Haven
poetry
how to buy a goddamn big car:
Give me money and then walk away from the booth and then it will smell like french fries and you’ll have a beautiful afterimage in the shape of a pitcher you pick the pitcher I don’t care what kind of pitcher then the parking lot will glow with white lines like always and the summer will be the air that it is and nothing else and the sky that it is also and you ignore those things because then the smell of french fries and berries all the kinds of berries and then. Take your new smell and walk and take two lefts and sit on the best ground you can find. Sleep if it suits you. Watch out in case anyone might not want you to sleep there. Then take out everything in your pockets and set it in front of you. It is faith to do this and then sleep and it is also an offering and a gift and it is best to do so not to hold yourself down in case
very small drawing, Antoni Sieczkowski
you don’t wake up etc.
David Boffa
52
fiction
Shave
53
always excites him. Usually he laughs at this, both because he finds the creation of foam amusing but also because he knows that if he laughs then his mother will laugh, too, and few things make him happier than seeing that.
The boy has been worried about his beard for several days now. He stands
He likes the feeling of warm water against the skin of his face, and
in front of the mirror in his bedroom and he looks at his chin and upper
then the light and smooth feeling of the foam as his mother dabs it on his
lip. The skin is smooth, fine, and dotted with a few tiny black hairs. There
chin and upper lip. Sometimes she jokingly puts it on her face, and this too
is a small collection of hairs on the chin and a similar amount on the upper
he likes, although she always wipes it off before moving on. She jokes and
lip. He raises his hand and moves the soft fingers over his face, perhaps
laughs when using the foam but when she finishes applying it and takes the
a millimeter away from the skin, allowing the surface of his palm to
razor in her hand she is always very serious, and the boy knows then that
graze the tips of the sparse hairs, whose contact with his hand is almost
he should be still and be serious, too. He sits and imagines himself to be
imperceptible. He lets his hand fall and puts it at his side, and then he moves
completely motionless, trying to freeze every muscle in his body.
his face around a bit, examining it from different angles. It is unclear to him
Sometimes, when he is sitting so very still, he likes to imagine that
if there is a difference from the last time he looked, but he knows there is a
he is a statue. Invariably this makes him think of the statues in the museum
difference from when he is clean-shaven. He sighs and looks away from the
he and his mother visited. He remembers the vastness of the interior space,
mirror and walks out of the room.
so unlike the inside of any building he had ever been in, and the way the
It has been some time now since he has been clean-shaven,
sounds of footsteps and people talking seemed to fill that space and the air
although he is not entirely sure of how many days have passed. When he is
around him. He remembers, too, the statues, their stone surfaces as white
clean-shaven he can pass his hand over his face without any resistance and
as the shaving foam, their figures frozen in time. Some but not all of them
without feeling the tiny hairs against his palm. As he walks into the living
were naked, and when he pointed this out to his mother she smiled and
room of the apartment he looks at his mother, sees that she is still lying on
laughed a little and nodded. They spent a long time in that museum space,
the couch, and sits down quietly in his little chair by the television. At one
the cavernous rooms seeming to go on endlessly, the statues far greater
point he thinks he hears her stir behind him and so he turns to look but she
in number than he could ever hope to count. He remembers too that there
has not moved. He sighs again and returns to the TV.
were other children in the museum, some of them with their mothers, some
For twenty or so minutes he watches cartoons. He waits patiently
in groups. In his friendly manner he would often wave to them, and though
and without saying anything, although the beard bothers him and he would
some would wave back not all did, and some instead turned away or only
prefer to be shaved. Occasionally, and without thinking, he puts his hand up
pointed at him.
to his face and absentmindedly feels at the patches of hair.
While he was sitting so very still and thinking of statues and the
He likes shaving. More accurately, he likes being shaved. He likes
museum the face of his mother would bend close to his and then the hand
sitting on the lid of the toilet seat with his feet only just touching the
with the razor would come up, and while the free hand steadied his face, her
ground while his mother shakes the can of shaving cream and then squirts
other hand would move the razor over the shaving cream. When she did this
a pile into her hand. The sudden rush of air from the can, which creates a
he kept even his eyes still, lest some movement by them be transmitted
swelling bubble of white foam where previously there had been nothing,
through his face. In a handful of strokes the shaving cream would be cleared
55
54
from the boy’s face and his mother would stand back and look at him,
never thinking it something mundane or basic and never getting bored or angry, even
checking to see if she had missed anything. If there were no spots to go
in the early days when he had dropped and broken things, the days before all the
over, his mother would put the razor down and have the boy stand up in
plates and cups changed to plastic. When they had finished with the dishes he went
front of the sink and she would tell him to wash his face, which he did. Then
into the living room and there he sat and watched TV, occasionally hearing his mother
she would towel him dry and squirt a small amount of aftershave lotion into
move about the house, talking to him or to no one in particular.
his waiting hands. She always tells him to rub it in good even though he
After a while he felt he had to go to the bathroom, which although he could
knows exactly what to do with it, so many times have they done this ritual.
do by himself was another activity they often did together. When he called out to his
But the act of telling him this information seemed to make her happy and so
mother that he had to go pee he waited for a response, but heard none. He did not want
it made the boy happy, too.
to disturb her, so he waited a little longer, but when he feared going in his pants he
In this way he was shaved, and he felt right and clean and content.
went on his own, doing his best to be neat and careful.
He knew he could not shave himself but that did not bother him. He liked the
Then there were other things that they did not do together. He grew hungry
feeling of being shaved and he liked the feeling of doing something together
and still his mother said nothing. The boy waited patiently, watching TV and walking
as a team. In his estimation it had not been simply that he could not shave
around the house, and then it grew dark and though the boy grew even hungrier he
himself. Rather, there were parts of the task that his mother did better and
was also very tired. When he could no longer stay awake he slept in the living room,
parts that were left to him, like the application of the aftershave or the
bathed in the glow of the television. The next day he was hungrier than he could ever
splashing of water on his face when they finished.
remember being, and for the first time pulled a box of crackers from a shelf and ate them by himself. There had been a period of time like this and now he had slept and ate and used the bathroom again and though he could do these things alone he liked doing
It was therefore not so different from many things they did together, things that the boy did not or could not do alone but that he did
them better with his mother as his partner, and he knew too that there were things like shaving he could not do on his own.
with his mother. Things like putting his shoes on, in which he pulled the shoes over his feet and his mother neatly tied the laces. Or eating, in which he set out the places—silverware and plates and cups—while his mother prepared the food. There had been only the slightest sense in the boy that
The cartoons on the TV came to an end and the boy stood up. He walked back
these were things he could not do entirely on his own, so accustomed was
into his room and looked again at his chin and upper lip and he rubbed his hand over
he to doing them in tandem with his mother, his partner for more days and
the soft fuzz of the hairs. In the mirror he looked at his face and at the sprinkling of
years than he could remember.
tiny black hairs and the almond-shaped eyes and the smooth skin. When he finished
But now it has been a little while since they have done something together. After the last time he had been shaved he and his mother had
looking, he sighed and walked back out through the kitchen and past the milk that he had spilled earlier when making cereal on his own, and back to the living room.
eaten breakfast together, as usual. Then he had done his part in the job,
His mother was still lying on the couch and the boy approached her slowly
handing up dirty plates while she took them from him and washed them,
and quietly. He did not want to bother her but he was still hungry and he had not slept
always thanking him at every plate and cup and utensil handed up to her,
well in some time and he wanted more than anything to have her shave him and leave
56
him feeling clean and content. He leaned close to her head and tried calling her name but she did not stir so he called it again, a little louder this time, but still she did not move. With a tentative hand he touched her cold skin and pushed at her shoulder a little and called to her but she did not move and her body remained stiff. Once more he pushed at her and called out “Mom� but there was no answer, and the only movement was a tiny cascade of silver-grey hair. The boy sighed again and turned away and sat back in his chair by the television set. He did not know why she slept and he wondered how much longer it would be and what he would do until then. His hand came up to his face and he touched the hairs on his chin again and then sat back and waited, patiently, waited and worried about how much longer he would have to wait, wanting only to watch the shaving cream fill the palm of his mother’s hand and feel the cream against his skin and the gentle slide of the razor, sitting still and silent as a statue, repressing even the urge to smile
bonding fallen fruits, Claudia Olendrowicz
broadly at the face of his mother in that effort to be so still.
58
Norbert Lange
poetry
Flügelschuh
59
so will der Schuh wohl auch Harmonie, denn ihn gewogen und wörtlich genommen: ein Ohr, das bis zur Schuhspitze
Die Zunge gleitet es herunter und
dem schlürfenden Gang der Sätze
schlängelt eine Weile dort, um unter
folgt, ist er wohl auch, und
Geräuschen an der Ferse vorbei unter die Fußsohle zu rutschen, ins Ungewisse,
Füße, die diesen Weg wohl täglich
Dunkle, sonst nur getreten, und
nehmen, können im Spiegel des Schuhs, Dank ihm, worin ihr Wesen liegt
dort Funken zu machen, kriecht sie weiter
erkennen; und hören zugleich
in den vorderen Schuh, die Zehen weiter
was sie im Gehen sprechen, und
zu umspielen und zieht zurück knisternd durch die Zehen in den Fuß,
beide so tönend; geht auch jeder Schritt
durch ihn, seine Wurzel, und
nahtlos über in den anderen, die von ihnen getretenen Worte kapierst
Ballen, Sohle und Rist zugleich entlang
du kaum; mit denkenden Füßen in
wie Strom, zieht aus dem Vorfuß
Einklang steht man nämlich selten, und
über die Sesambeine, angemacht, zurück zum Spann, dort von Neuem zu beginnen,
hinkst du hinterher auf wie scheppernden
so geht es mit den Füßen zu, und
Füßen, statt die Luft mit Flügeln flirrenden Gesanges, plump
manche Schuhe ziehst du an, aus andere,
den Boden zu treten, von dem sich
anschmiegsamere Orte richtet deine Zunge zu,
die Schuhe beschwingt entfernen, und
worauf, nach etwas Warten, zögerlich, dann sprudelnd Speichelfluss – gleicht der Schuh einem Mund, und der leichte Schnalzlaut, den Fuß in geläufigem Schuh gesprochen, so folgt dem Denken ein Ton erst schleppend, bei jedem Schritt schließlich von Schmatzen begleitet, und
wie die Füße hier ihr Limit spüren
60
Norbert Lange
poetry
Wingshoe
61
after all the shoe seeks harmony as well, for being weighed and taken literally, it’s actually also an ear that follows
The tongue slides down and
the slurping gait of the spoken passages
snakes a while there, slipping under
up to the toe-cap, and
noises past the heel under the sole into the uncertain,
feet, which actually take this way
the dark, otherwise only stepped on, and,
daily, can recognize in the mirror of the shoe, thanks to it, wherein
making sparks there, creeps further,
their essence lies; and at the same time
to the shoe’s forepart, further
can hear what they while going speak, and
to dance around the toes and then draws back crackling through toes into the foot,
both so sonorous; also if every step
through it, its tarsus, and
goes smoothly into the next, the words that they tread out, you barely
simultaneously along the ball, sole, and instep
understand; with thinking feet namely
like static, draws out of the forefoot via
you rarely stand in sync, and
the sesamoids, turned on, back to the arch there to begin again,
you limp behind like clanking
that’s how it goes with feet, and
feet, instead of walking the air with wings of flitting song, plodding
some shoes you pull on, off others,
along the ground, from which the shoes
your tongue works into lither places,
distance themselves with bounce, and
whereupon, after a little waiting, hesitant, then sparkling salivation—
like the feet feel here their limit
if the shoe is like a mouth, and the soft clucking, the foot being spoken in the pedestrian shoe, so a tone follows thinking, first schlepping, with every step attended then by smacking, and
—translated by Julian Smith-Newman
Girl (oil on canvas), Alexander Adams Girl (guache on paper), Alexander Adams
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list of
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Contributors Sharif El Gammal-Ortiz is a poet and translator from Carolina, Puerto Rico. His poetry has been featured in the Acentos Review, Sargasso, Why I am Not a Painter, and SAND. He received his MFA from Columbia University’s School of the Arts in poetry and translation, and is still looking for a publisher for
Alexander Adams is a British writer and artist based in Berlin. Since studying
his first collection of poems, Phenomenology of Brother. He lives in Puerto
fine art at Goldsmiths College, London, he has gone on to exhibit around
Rico.
the world. He writes art criticism for Apollo, The Art Newspaper, and The Jackdaw. He was artist-in-residence at the Albers Foundation, Connecticut
Hanna Fiegenbaum is a Masters student of Philosophy at Humboldt
in 2011. Three Strikes, his first book of poems and drawings, was published
University of Berlin and currently working for the Art History Department
by Bottle of Smoke Press last year.
at the same university. She has previously worked in different fields of science as well as in public relations, journalism, and arts. After studying
William Black has new work appearing or forthcoming in The Sun, The
at Goldsmiths College, London, in 2006 she has been occasionally working
Southern Review, Threepenny Review, Prairie Schooner, Boulevard, and
as a freelance illustrator.
elsewhere. He teaches creative writing at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.
Elisabeth Fisherkeller attended the University of Wyoming until her recent graduation with her Master of Arts. She was born in Woodrow County in
David Boffa is originally from New Jersey. Since leaving his home state, he
Kentucky in 1985, spent her childhood in Texas, and ended up in Wyoming
has lived in Rome and, most recently, the wilderness of Maine, where he was
where she lives to this day. She has recently finished a translation from
teaching art history. He looks forward to returning to Italy (and civilization)
Spanish to English of the Chilean short fiction anthology Porrotos Granados.
as soon as possible.
She hopes to continue with her translation in the future.
Becky Crook is a writer, editor, and translator from Seattle, Washington.
Steven Johannes Fowler is a poet based in London. He is the author of the
Her works have appeared in The Other Journal, Geez Magazine, and two
collections Red Museum (Knives Forks & Spoons Press), Fights (Veers Books),
anthologies. For the past four years, she has lived in Berlin, where she co-
Minimum Security Prison Dentistry (AAA Press) and Incidents of Anti-Semitism
founded SAND Journal in 2010; until recently, she worked for the journal as
(Eggbox Publishing). He is the editor of 3am Magazine and both VLAK and
the editor-in-chief. Her recent endeavors have included writing her first
Lyrikline in the UK. He has had work commissioned by the Tate Britain,
novel, adjusting to becoming a mother, and learning a new piano piece by
the London Sinfonietta and Mercy. He is a member of the Contemporary
Chopin.
Poetics Research Centre, University of London. sjfowlerpoetry.com, blutkitt.blogspot.com
Katie Eberhart writes about the slim interface between people and nature. She has a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Pacific Lutheran
Joseph Goosey lives in Jacksonville, Florida and does not like it. His most
University in Washington state and degrees in geography and economics.
recent thing is called WE, THE INSTITUTIONALIZED and can be read at
Her work has appeared in Cirque Journal and other places. After twenty-
notapunkrockpress.com. To make money he reads court records.
eight years in the same house in Alaska, she now resides in Oregon, where she blogs about nature and poetry. solsticelight.com
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Catherine Hales lives in Berlin’s Bohemian Village. Her first full collection,
Sophia Moseley is an artist and writer currently residing in Birmingham, in
hazard or fall, was published by Shearsman Books in 2010, along with
the UK. Her latest work has revolved around collage and print, although
a pamphlet, a bestiary of so[nne][r]ts, by Oystercatcher Press. Her
she is interested in fiction, particularly short stories inspired by strangers
translations of German poet Norbert Hummelt appeared in Berlin Fresco
she comes across. Otherwise, her inspiration comes from saved dialogue
(Shearsman 2010). She is included in the 2010 Shearsman anthology Infinite
in the form of old postcards, old letters and a hoard of handwritten notes,
Difference. Other Poetry by UK Women Poets, edited by Carrie Etter and the
scraps from magazines and books, and saved memorabilia, which she
Archive of the Now has recordings of her reading her work. Her poems have
sometimes incorporates into her work.
been translated into German and Czech. She is co-coordinator of Poetry
postdarling.com
Hearings, Berlin’s festival of poetry in English. David Nee is a freelance writer and graduate student based in Cambridge, Leif Haven is currently in transit. He has a website at leifhaven.com that links
Massachusetts. In his working hours, he reads, and thinks about,
to other publications, a weblog, social media profiles, and other things.
Renaissance literature. In his waking hours, he writes, and thinks about, poetry. He was born in Ithaca, NY.
Erin Kelly is a theatre maker and writer hailing from Melbourne, Australia. Erin was the winner of the John Marsden Prize for Short Fiction, nominated
Jennifer Nelson is an art historian. Other work of hers has recently appeared
for the Melbourne Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Prize and was also
or is forthcoming in 6x6, Action Yes, Death and Life of American Cities,
published in Women of Letters in 2011. For theatre, she recently wrote
Handsome, the Journal for Religious and Cultural Theory, and Volt. She lives in
and presented Here, In the Sugarcane and is the recipient of an ArtStart
Queens and misses Berlin.
Australia Council grant, Theatreworks ‘In the Works’ development, and a Playwrighting Australia script development award.
Claudia Olendrowicz was born in 1983 in Königs Wusterhausen. She studied Freie Kunst at the Bauhaus University in Weimar, where she received her
Norbert Lange was born in 1978 in Gdynia, Poland and lives in Berlin. He
degree in 2008. She now lives and works in Berlin. She is interested in the
has published the poetry collections Rauhfasern (2005) and Das Schiefe, das
different aspects of the phenomenon guest, analyzing the different forms
Harte und das Gemalene (2012) and the essay collection, Das Geschriebene
of this special and fragile prospect, which includes further experiences in
mit der Schreibhand (2010). He has also translated various American and
order to develop this research.
British poets, including Ed Dorn, Andrew Duncan, Charles Olson, George Oppen, and Kevin Prufer. He is the editor for the eZine, Karawa.net.
Kenneth Pobo has a collection of micro-fiction called Tiny Torn Maps published by Deadly Chaps in 2011. His stories can be read online at
Emily Lundin grew up in the Deep South and moved to Berlin on a Creative
Apocrypha & Abstractions, Short, Fast, And Deadly, Blue Lake Review, Wilde
Writing Fulbright. She teaches writing at various universities and
Oats, and elsewhere.
previously worked in film notably on the PBS documentary, Faubourg Tremé: The Untold Story of Black New Orleans. Her fiction can be read in Asymptote, Bordercrossing-Berlin, Cutthroat: a Journal of the Arts, the extra room, Oregon Literary Review, and the anthology, Writing as Revision. She is finishing a novel set in Mississippi.
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Utz Rachowski was born in 1954 in Plauen/Vogtland, East Germany. He was
Piia Rossi is an artist and an educator born in Finland. She is currently living
arrested in 1979 for “subversive agitation”: copying and distributing his
and working in Germany and Finland as an artist and a PhD student. Piia’s
own poetry as well as texts by Jürgen Fuchs, Wolf Biermann, and Reiner
work can be described as mainly participatory and collaborative. In her
Kunze. He was expatriated and released to West Germany through Amnesty
work she inquires into issues such as home, belonging, pining, and desire.
International in 1980, where he studied art history and philosophy. Since
Piia is the founder of the Trailing Spouses art collective, which operates in
then, he has been a freelance writer of prose, poetry, and radio plays. From
Bielefeld, Germany.
1993-1999, he co-edited the literary journal Ostragehege, and since 2003,
trailingspousesdotcom.wordpress.com, piiarossi.com
he has worked as a rehabilitation adviser to victims of GDR dictatorship under the auspices of the Saxony State Commission for the Stasi Files.
Antoni Sieczkowski lives in Warsaw, Poland. He is a student of the Graphic
He has given readings and lectures throughout Germany, USA, Sweden,
Department at Warsaw’s Academy of Arts. He works with illustration,
Denmark, Senegal, Lithuania, and Poland and has been translated into
drawings, and graphic design. In 2011, at the Gallery Turbo, he had his first
English, Polish, French, Serbian, and Finnish.
solo show: “Draw, there’s no fucking around.” At the moment he prepares workshops curated by Jakub Swircz called “What am I looking at,” which
Monika Rinck was born in Zweibrücken in 1969 and lives in Berlin. After
will be focusing on practical problems around contemporary visual culture.
her university years devoted to history, comparative linguistics, and
warsaw-hedgehog.blogspot.com/2012/04/in-space-of-drawings.html
religious studies, she attracted attention with her Begriffsstudio, a website (www.begriffsstudio.de) and book (2001) of striking concepts and weird
Alejandro Zambra lives in Santiago de Chile, where he was born in 1975. He
neologisms. Her first book of poems, Verzückte Distanzen, appeared in
has published the poetry collections Bahía Inútil and Mudanza, the essay
2004 from zu Klampen!, followed by zum fernbleiben der umarmung (2007),
collection No leer and the novels Bonsái, La vida privada de los árboles, and
HELLE VERWIRRUNG / Rincks Ding-und Tierleben (2009), and the book of
Formas de volver a casa. Melville House published Bonsái in 2008, translated
essays, Ah, das Love-Ding (2006), all from kookbooks. A new book of poems
by Carolina de Robertis. In 2009, The Private Life of Trees appeared in Open
HONIGPROTOKOLLE appeared in Spring 2012. Her awards include the
Letter, translated by Megan McDowell, who will also translate Ways of Going
Ernst Meister Prize (2008), Georg K. Glaser Prize (2010) and in 2012, the
Home, to be published in 2013 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (US) and Granta
Kunstpreis Berlin. Monika Rinck cooperates with composers and musicians
Books (UK).
and teaches from time to time. Michael Ritterson is a literary translator living in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. His translations of German poetry and short prose have appeared in, among others, International Poetry Review, New European Poets, The Literary Review, and Foreign Policy Magazine online.