Selected Poems and Prose by Benn Gottfried Paisey David

Author:Benn, Gottfried, Paisey, David [Gottfried Benn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781847775092
Publisher: Carcanet
Published: 2013-02-14T05:00:00+00:00

Through motionless blue mist, driven inland from the nearby sea, Rönne strode out next morning on the way to his hospital.

This lay beyond the town and all paved streets. He had to walk across earth that was soft, letting violets through; dissolved and penetrated, he swayed as he trod.

There from gardens the crocus threw itself at him, the candle of early mass in poetic speech, and especially the yellow variety, which to the Greeks and Romans had been the epitome of charm, no wonder it transported him into the kingdom of heavenly things. In pools of crocus juices the god bathed. A wreath of blossoms kept intoxication at bay. By the Mediterranean the fields of saffron: the tripartite scar; flat pans; horsehair sieves above fires, light and open.

He drove himself further: Arabic za-fara, Greek kroké. There was a Corvinus, King of Hungary, who had known how to avoid saffron stains when eating. The dye came nearer without any trouble, the spice, the flower-meadow and the Alpine valley.

Still deep in the satisfaction of drawing such plentiful associations, he came across a glass shield bearing the words Maita Cigarettes, illuminated by a ray of sunlight. And now by way of Maita – Malta – beaches – shining – ferry – harbour – mussel-eaters – depravities – came the bright chiming sound of a slight splintering, and Rönne tottered in a kind of happiness. But then he entered the hospital: an unyielding stare, an uncompromising will: to link the stimuli and sensations meeting him today to the store he already had, not leaving any out, tying in each one. He imagined a secret structure, something of armour and eagle’s flight, a kind of Napoleonic longing, such as the conquest of a hedge behind which he was resting, Werff Rönne, thirty years old, a doctor.

Ha, not so easy today, open your legs and down from the chair, young lady, the thin blue artery from the hip into the bush, we must make a note of that! I know temples with these arteries, narrow white temples, tired creations, but I will note this one, snaking, a little branch of violet blood! What? If the conversation should turn to small arteries – I stand there ready armed, especially on little skin arteries: At the temple?? O gentlemen!! I have also seen them on other organs, thinly snaking, a little branch of violet blood. Should I sketch it for you? This is the way it went – should I get up? The entry point? The portal vein? The ventricle? The discovery of the circulation of the blood – – –? Do you see, any number of impressions to be considered? They whisper: who is this man? Standing there composedly? Rönne is my name, gentlemen. I occasionally collect such little observations; not uninteresting, but naturally quite unimportant, a small contribution to the great structure of knowledge and recognition of reality, ha! ha!

And you, ladies, we know each other! Permit me to create you, dress you up in your

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