by Tom Kuhn
And we had our daily bread on the Prairies
A fresh wind and the moon on Saturday evenings
And on the Prairies things weren’t good enough for us
2
We had a house in San Francisco
An automobile business and new clothes
And: things are bad here, said Billy
But in Massachusetts they’ll be better
And we had food to eat in San Francisco
Pretty clothes and jazz too on Saturday evenings
And in San Francisco things weren’t good enough for us
3
We had a tent in Massachusetts
An oilfield and a drilling rig
Yet: things are bad here, said Billy
But in Chicago they’ll be better
And we had a roof over our heads in Massachusetts
A stove and the Bible on Saturday evenings
And in Massachusetts things weren’t good enough for us
4
We haven’t got a room in Chicago
Not a dollar, no prospects, my God
And now: things are bad here, says Billy
But they won’t be better anywhere else
And once we had money and prospects
Work in the week and free on Saturday evenings
And everywhere it wasn’t good enough for us
Old Mother Beimlen
Old Mother Beimlen has a pegleg
She walks quite well with that and a shoe
If we ask her can we see her pegleg
Be good, she says, and I’ll show it you.
In that pegleg there is a nail
And on that nail she hangs her key
So she can find it even in the dark
When she comes home after a drink or three.
When old Mother Beimlen goes out on the game
And brings a client back
On the landing she turns the electric off
So when she shows him in it is pitch black.
The crushing impact of the cities
But those without hands
Without air between them
Had the force of pure ether
In them was constantly
The power of emptiness which is the greatest power
They were called Short-of-Breath, Absence, No-Shape
And they crushed as do mountains of granite
Falling continuously out of the air
Oh I saw faces
Like renegade gravel
In rapidly streaming water
Very uniform, many gathered together
Made a hole
That was very large
And for now I still speak only
Of the strongest race
Concerning the travails of the first period
Suddenly
Some flew into the air
Building upwards, others from the highest rooftops
Flung their hats up high and screamed
Thus high the next
But those coming after
After the sale of the roof they were used to and fleeing the night frosts
Pressed in their turn and saw with haddock eyes
The tall dwellings
Those coming after
For at that time folded within the same walls
In haste
Four generations ate together
Had never in their childhood year
Seen on the palm of the hand the nail in the stone of the wall
For them metal and stone
Grew in to one another
So brief was the time
That between morning and evening
There was no noon
And already on the old familiar ground
Stood mountains of concrete
And we after so long a time . . .
And we after so long a time snowed in
Like sorrow itself having almost passed away
If now there must be storms in the month of April
Yet may heaven, for me, sometimes be tranquil
Yet may the winds, for me, be calm occasionally
Laugh, I beg you, here and at once, and love
Time runs, time laughs and will not come again
For breasts, throat, mouth and beautiful hair not yet
Enjoyed enough: ask God in heaven
For time and a few cold nights is all you’ll get
Remembering a certain M.N.
1
Lasting as rubber
As he is, so he’ll stay
Whoever you are
You’ll not bend him your way.
But why not rum from a tumbler
And why not the hundred percent
In knowing the bitterest may there
Perhaps not be some point?
2
Did you think her cheap?
Did you say: cotton?
But now, honest truth
Was she your possession?
3
Did you lie on her bed?
Your hand! False or true?
I know on the corridor
She did not recognize you.
4
You want to forget her?
Tear up her photo.
Then, yes, you’ll forget her.
But never her words to you.
5
Say it was dark
Say the dark was good
Remember: it was ebb tide
Forget: it was flood.
6
If you say you left her
Swear you forgot her.
Don’t say she was nothing
Say you saw someone better.
Oh why the rum from the tumbler
And why also the hundred percent
In knowing the bitterest, for sure
There may perhaps be some point.
Eight thousand poor people come before the city
On the road from Salgótarján, outside Budapest, eight thousand unemployed miners with their wives and children are lying in the open fields. In the first two days of their struggle they had no food. They had scanty rags for clothing. They look like skeletons. They have vowed that if they get no bread and no work they will proceed to Budapest, even if it costs blood, for now they have nothing to lose. Around Budapest the militia are drawn up. They have strict orders to fire should there be the least disturbance.
So we went down to the biggest city
A thousand of us had not eaten
A thousand of us were still hungry
And a thousand of us wanted feeding.
The General looked out of his window
And said: You can’t stop here
Don’t be awkward, go home quietly now
You can write and tell me what your needs are.
We stayed there standing on the highway
Believed they’d come out and feed us
But who came to see us? Nobody
All we saw was the smoke from their houses.
Said the General: You’re not allowed here so many
And he began the tally.
We said: As many as you see, that many
Have had nothing to eat today.
We built ourselves no shelter
Washed none of the rags we wore
We said: We can’t wait much longer.
Said the General: That’s for sure.
Said we: But we can’t all die.
Said the General: How wrong you are!
The townspeople heard gunfire
They said: There’s fire out there.
Oh, we had a ball back in Uganda . . .
Oh, we had a ball back in Uganda
Seven cents a chair on the veranda
Oh, the poker games with that old tiger
Oh, we played so wild for this and that
When we bet the hide of Papa Krüger
The old man saw and raised us with his hat.
Oh, the moon shone down so peaceful in Uganda!
We sat there as the daw
n had come and gone
The breeze was but a gentle sigh
And the game went on.
It wasn’t everyone who had the cash to try
A round of poker underneath that sky
With a tiger in a suit and tie
(Seven cents a chair on the veranda).
Ballad of the faithless women
1
You want a woman, son, to say, ‘she’s mine’
That’s never going to happen here of course
Although you may not be an ugly swine
And yet your cock looks like it’s off a horse
There’s women who’d complain, kick up a fuss
Don’t go for them: they’re really not worth much.
2
Lie to her, no one’s got a bigger cock
And when you sit together, son, be canny
Keep a firm grip on your axe, or else some jock
Will stick a pillow underneath her fanny.
There’s women who’d resist, shout out and such
Don’t go for them: they’re really not worth much.
3
Stick a knife in the bedpost when you go to rest
And don’t go out unless you really must
And if you do, then take her too, that’s best
Or else some other bloke will grab her breast.
There’s women who’ll give in to any touch
Don’t go for them: they’re really not worth much.
4
Don’t use her too hard—it’s no joke
Or else you’ll sleep too deep, that can be bad
If you’re too sleepy for a smoke
She may run off to someone else’s pad.
There’s women might respect your sleep, and watch
Don’t go for them: they’re really not worth much.
Money
Don’t be afraid of the dollar, child.
You should long for the dollar, child.
(WEDEKIND)
I don’t say, Work!—I won’t lead you astray—
For human beings were not made to work.
But money, see that money comes your way.
Money is good. In the pursuit of money do not shirk.
Man hunts his fellow man with snares.
The wickedness of the world is great. Therefore
Get money in your purse for there’s
Nothing the wicked world loves more.
Got money, they’ll cling on you as ticks do, tight:
We’ll know you then like the light of the sun.
Got none, your children must put you out of sight
And say, We do not know the man.
Got money, they look at you and know who’s boss.
Got none, no one has heard of you.
Money will buy your case the star witness.
Money is truth. Got money, you’re a hero.
What your woman tells you, you’d better believe it but
Don’t go visiting her without money.
Without money you lose her, you’re a have-not.
Without money only dumb animals will keep you company.
Man honours money. He extols money above God.
If you want to make sure your enemy
Won’t rest in peace under the sod
Write this on his stone, Here lies Money.
That is his lot, the man you loved . . .
1
That is his lot, the man you loved
To lie in the night
Of his burial
In a thin rain
And to complete the parting
From his friends
At the first supper.
2
How you designate
The flat world! How else but with
Vapid copies
Of its ineffable vapidity.
3
Here I lie
Of one mind with God.
And if not of one mind?
My life was
Courageous.
And if not courageous?
The world is
Sufficient.
And if not sufficient?
Matinee in Dresden
1
And they invited three gods
To Alibi on the river Alibe
And made a great promise
Of one hundred and fifty hecatombs for each one of them
And honour as much as they should require.
2
But when they arrived only the rain was there
To welcome them.
And when they came to the festival hall of the city of Alibi
They heard a mighty noise from within.
For a celebration was under way in honour of the great Alea.
And they entered and saw their own chairs standing
Where the coats were hung and rotten eggs were boiled.
Then the divinities wept among these coats
That the rain had welcomed.
3
But there came to them Sibillus, a man from the city
Who had known them long and he comforted them:
And went about to gather people of goodwill
Who would honour the good divinities in Alibi, the city on the river Alibe.
But he found nobody.
4
Said Sibillus, the man from the city of Alibi:
Let us go now to the table of fat Alea
Who is the world’s friend and there we may gather up the crumbs
That fall from his rich table.
And they went and came before these tables.
But no crumbs fell there.
5
Then Sibillus lost heart and said to the three divinities:
I beg you do not despair, do not for want of the honours due to you
Throw yourselves into the river Alibe
Lest the river burst its banks and
Wash away our city of Alibi!
Assertion
1
Be quiet.
Which do you suppose changes more easily
A stone or your opinion of it?
I have always been the same.
2
What does a photograph amount to?
A few grand words
You can rightly ascribe to anyone?
I have perhaps not got any better
But
I have always been the same.
3
You can say:
In the past I ate more beef
Or that on wrong roads
I went faster.
But the best unreasonableness is the sort
That passes and
I have always been the same.
4
What does a heavy rain weigh?
A few thoughts more or less
A few feelings or none
Where all things are insufficient
Nothing suffices.
I have always been the same.
Great men
1
Great men say a good deal that is dumb
And dumb is what they think all people are
And people say nothing and suffer them
Hour after hour, year after year
2
But great men eat and great men drink
And fill their bellies full
And the other people hear about their deeds
And eat and drink as well
3
For his very life Great Alexander
Needed the city of Babylon
And there have been other people
Who didn’t and you are one
4
Great Copernicus handled a telescope
That’s how his nights were spent
He calculated: the earth goes round the sun
And so he thought he’d understood the firmament
5
Great Bert Brecht did not understand the simplest things
And the most difficult, for example grass, he thought long and hard about
And he honoured great Napoleon
Because, like him, he ate
6
Great men behave as though they were wise
And talk very loud as the deaf do
We should give great men due praise
But believe them? No.
The cities, the black-pox cities . . .
The cities, the black-pox cities
Are full to the brim with our kind
And many a one among us
For a meal will change his mind.
In cities like this our fathers
Fear for us day and night
Among the men in black leathers
Few will treat you right.
The good man and blameless
Can’t be compared with them
Who speed off grinning and shameless
On bikes away from him.
When our Lord Jesus . . .
When our Lord Jesus was born on earth
His mother had a hard time giving birth.
It came on sooner than she expected
And they had no money for a hotel bed.
Mary sat herself down on a stone
And Joseph ran around after a loan
But got no joy wherever he ran
For who’ll lend money to a working man?
But they found a farmer at the last minute
And he had a stable and offered them it.
That was the turning point. Strange to tell
Everything after that went pretty well.
A box made a table and the stable lad
Smuggled in a fish for them. He had