Limp

24 July 2012

I shall limp to my grave. No, no, that is wrong;
I shall lie on my back in a shiny black car.
Two uniformed men will manoeuvre my corpse
By trolley past tombstones and crosses and stars
To mountains of soil from a freshly dug grave.


There’ll be stony-faced men and eyes dabbing women
And maybe a whisper from one that I knew:
“He hated the sound of the dirt being shovelled
And crashing like drumbeats on him that I knew…”
But I will be still and in silence agree.

Double Dipping

30 AUGUST 2008

DOUBLE DIPPING

You are from the Elysian Observer? Not that I care. Those two blokes came by here, not together, mind you, the one with the crown, his name was Arthur, oh, King Arthur! Sorry! Well, he came first, very gentlemanly, very polite, could I sharpen his sword, and how much would it come to?  Well, I said, this is worth a complete overhaul, pretty blunt at the tip. And I gave him an estimate – 20 Gulden, and if you want to pay in Marks or Shekels, that will be alright. You see, I get quite a few customers from the Middle Ages, and the occasional enquiry from some biblical warrior, and of course Central European fanatics will never let up.

I Was There

16 July 2011

But I was there …

His name was Herzfeld, Dr. Herzfeld.   He taught Geography and History at the local college, the Marburg Institute. He must have been in his thirties; tall, amiable, running to fat, too young to have served in the army in the First World War.  After a spirited lecture on the 17th century peace treaties at Osnabrück and Münster, when the 30 years feud in Germany between Catholics and Protestants was ostensibly laid to rest, he clapped me on the shoulder as we left the classroom.  “We’ve got some way to go, eh?” he chortled.  I was sure that this was meant to be recognition of each other as fellow Jews, living in what is now called the Weimar Republic.

Scarlet Woman

3 September 2011

SCARLET WOMAN

The first Scarlet Woman I ever met wore an ankle length blue dressing gown and felt slippers. Her hair streaked brown, blond with wisps of white, hung over one shoulder. She stood at the open door of this terrace house in North Melbourne, shivering slightly, and looked at me questioningly. The time was 11 o’clock in the morning.

If I Win Tattslotto....

 written 16 September 2010

If I win Tattslotto …

My name is Morris.   When I turned seventeen I was still virgin.  I had better supply details to prove this statement. I am an only child, male, of a stiff-lipped father and an ever-fussing mother.  I started life in a rented ramshackle house in Lower Bluecreek (to this day an undesirable neighbourhood), but now we live in a three story (counting the basement) villa in a fashionable outer suburb.