Pesticide Fields
For Rachel Carson,1907-1968
In La Belle Dame sans Merci
John Keats writes about the sedge
That withered from the lake
And the birds that stopped to sing.
But unlike the poet’s merciless Dame
You, Rachel, you were a Lady
Of great compassion.
The eels and the scombrids still swim
Under the Sea Wind somehow
Yet your Silent Spring evokes
A verdant season without bird song
On the pesticide fields.
Half a century ago you warned
That the abuse of DDT
And other chemicals harm
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poem by Paul Hartal
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The River of Permanence
It is not possible to step
Into the same river twice,
Said Heraclitus of Ephesus.
Since other and yet other waters
Keep flowing on,
The river is never the same.
And like the river,
Everything in the world
Is in constant change and flux.
Nonsense! Retorted Parmenides
Of Elea. Nothing is in flux.
Things never change, he said,
The world is permanent.
Objects of thought and speech
Must exist all the time.
They cannot change
Because change consists in
Things coming into being,
Or ceasing to exist;
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poem by Paul Hartal
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The Messiah in Strasshof
Inside the grinding burden of the crusty past
dreary facts hide, jubilant verities hibernate,
haunting memories trumpet and overwhelm the poet
he is compelled to tell what cannot be told.
But this is a true story and it must be told.
It happened long ago, as the ordeals of 1944
curled into the agonies of 1945
over the tormented body of war-weary Europe.
Exhaling anguished stench soaked in torrents of blood
mighty armies clashed in apocalyptic combats,
against the forces of darkness.
In the unrelenting wintry cold
the fighting intensified along frontless fronts.
There were daily air raids and dog fights in the skies.
Humming allied bombers flew towards their targets
and the German flak firing from the ground
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poem by Paul Hartal
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The Phantom of Time
Many years ago
I imagined time flowing
Like a river without banks.
Then I read some books
Of science and they said
That time is an irreversible arrow,
A relentless, unhaltable train,
That moves irresistibly, like fate.
It travels from Past to Future
On invisible wheels
Neglecting to stop
At the railway station
On the road, called Present.
But I was not absolutely sure
That this was all true.
So I watched the clocks
And I saw their hands moving,
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poem by Paul Hartal
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Batman Combats Oscar Wilde
“Are you serious? ” Frederick asked.
“Yes, Oscar Wilde, the writer”, George Batman said. “We had a conversation in the park.”
“Oh”, said Frederick. “Is he not dead? ”
“We had a conversation in the park”, Batman said.
“I see”, said Frederick.
“You remember that in The Picture of Dorian Gray Wilde argues that books cannot be moral or immoral, only well-written or badly written”, Batman commented.
“So? ”
“Well, I disagreed.”
“And why is that? ” Frederick inquired.
“Look. Wilde confuses content with style. A book with a moral message can either fail or excel in its stylistic presentation, and so can a book with immoral content.”
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poem by Paul Hartal
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Endangered Species: The moon
Dear Moon,
Old faithful friend
of lovers and romantics,
you are our nearest celestial body,
a main distance of 238,857 miles
from Earth,
with a lunar globe diameter
Of 3473 kilometers,
and nevertheless,
we can hide you by a finger
held at arm's length.
Dear Moon,
Only natural satellite of Earth,
You move in a slightly elliptical orbit
With a period of sidereal revolution
In 27 days,7 hours,43 minutes
And 11.5 seconds,
But I still have some concerns
Deep down in my heart.
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poem by Paul Hartal
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Samurai Competition
The steel blade of the sword flashed in the bright sunshine.
Second Lieutenant Toshiaki Mukai clutched the handle in both hands.
He raised the weapon high towards the sky and took a deep breath.
And then, with a powerful strike,
He slashed the head of the young Chinese man kneeling before him.
He smiled.
Did Second Lieutenant Tsuyoshi Noda win or lose?
On route to Nanjing, the two officers
Of the Japanese Imperial Army were
Competing with each other for being the first
To behead 100 people.
The competition was not a war crime, they said,
But in the Samurai spirit of kiri sute gomen,
The ancient feudal era custom
That authorized the Samurai to execute by sword anyone
From the lower classes who compromised the warrior’s honor.
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poem by Paul Hartal
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Shoes on the Bank of the Danube
On a sunny day in Budapest
The Danube Promenade offers a serene stroll.
The Royal Palace perched on Castle Hill
Greets you under an azure sky
And the mountains of Buda wave brightly
Their wooded hands across the river.
But along your peaceful walk listen
To the quiet murmur of the Danube,
Listen to the shifting waves that whisper
About bottomless grieves and sorrows.
The river drifts irremovable memories,
On the flowing waters float
Myriad sad stories.
Not far from the Parliament building
And the Academy of Sciences
Sculpted shoes cast in iron
Line the left bank of the Danube;
Between Roosevelt Square and Kossuth Square:
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poem by Paul Hartal
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The Dancer of Melody Palace
How is your beer?
Good. Bavaria brews the best beers in the world.
That is true. So what did you do in the war?
I was in the Russian front, wounded three times. How about you?
I was an SS guard in Auschwitz and Birkenau.
Was not that boring?
It was routine work. But unusual things had happened.
Don’t tell me that you ran out of Cyclon B for the gas chambers.
No. But on October 23,1943, we had some trouble
with a transport of 1,700 Jews who arrived from Bergen Belsen.
What sort of trouble?
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They Fought with their Bare Hands
To Mordecai Anielewicz (1919-1943)
Facing formidable forces,
Supported with tanks and artillery,
You knew that there was no way to win.
Nevertheless, you decided to fight,
Not for victory, but for Jewish honour.
So, one day in the spring of 1943,
You were 24 years old then,
The Zionist banner was hoisted
Over the Warsaw Ghetto wall,
Along with the Polish flag.
The SS troops preferred to use
Artillery fire, flamethrowers
And gas, or to blast the houses
By dynamite squads, rather than engage
In direct street fighting with untrained
And poorly armed young Jewish men
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poem by Paul Hartal
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