Cyber Corpse 2
Exquisite Corpse - A Journal of Letters and Life
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Poems
by
Else Lasker-Schuler

An Old Tibetan Carpet

Your soul in love with mine
is woven with it in the Tibetan carpet.
Beam in beam, enamored colors,
stars that wooed across the heavens.
Our feet rest upon the treasure
thousands upon thousands of meshes wide.
Sweet lama son on a musk-plant throne,
how long has your mouth kissed mine.
And cheek upon cheek, how many lifetimes brightly tied.

 

Song of the Blessed

Sabaoth speaks out of the evening:
Be prodigal-spend all your love!
So I may give you my crown pearls,
transform your blood into golden drops of honey,
and soak your lips with the scent of sweet almonds.
Be prodigal-spend all your love!
And gild my feasts with molten jubilation,
planting in the melancholy that weighs on Jerusalem
singing umbrella blossoms.
And your heart will become a splendid garden
where poets dream.
Oh, your heart will become a hanging garden,
homeland of every dawn,
and stars will enter your nights
whispering their light.
Yes, your arms will raise a thousand reaching branches,
and rocking, comfort my passion to return to paradise!

 

Homesick

I cannot speak the language
of this cool country,
or keep its pace.
Even the fleeting clouds
I cannot interpret.
The night is a step-queen.
Forever I must remember Pharoah's forests,
and kiss the image of my stars.
My lips sparkle brightly
and tell of faraway.
I am a colorful picture-book
lying open on your lap.
But your face spins
a veil of tears.
Out of my glittering birds
the corals have been gouged.
Upon the garden bushes
their soft nests turned to stone.
Who will consecrate my dead palaces?
They held the crowns of my ancestors,
whose prayers sank in the holy stream

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