Berlin

[Hawkman]

Weimar girl with your raven bob
and your black silk stockings rolled down on the job,
your lippy is smeared and your eye shadow’s smudged
and your champagne’s flavour will fade as you trudge
to the ghetto’s pace and the cabaret song,
for your final solution you’ll not wait long.

But until it arrives you’ll just visit your dives,
there where the decadent live their lives,
scream at the compère’s satirical jests
amid the cigar smoke and cigarette chests,
the madness denies what you see with your eyes
out on the streets as your liberty dies.

[PrinceMyshkin]

The sadness of this, the desperate decadence of the Weimar era when, approaching, the measured footsteps of the brown shirts could be heard.

[hillwalker]

Sally Bowles or her clone presumably.

Very concise and hard-hitting (the last line in verse 1 in particular). Great piece.

H

[PrinceMyshkin]

Sally Bowles or her clone presumably.

Very concise and hard-hitting (the last line in verse 1 in particular). Great piece.

H

Yes, the line you refer to brings to mind the brilliant song "If you could see her through my eyes" from Cabaret.

[Hawkman]

Thank you both Hill & Prince. A number of coincidences combined to inspire this piece - I'd been looking through my book on George Grosz with its grizzly portrayals of Weimar Berlin, and then there were a couple of programes on the box last night about Berlin and the film Cabaret. Obviously I had to write the poem, after all, you can't ignore cues like that!

I'm really most gratified that you both appreciate it.

Live and be well. H

[blank|verse]

Hi Hawk - I must say I was a little uneasy about the inclusion of the phrase 'final solution' in the first stanza's last line, but I can see the association.

That aside, it's a nicely written piece, and uses personification well. The rhymed couplets give the poem a jauntiness that perhaps reflects the 'roaring twenties' feel, but is also at odds with the subject matter, which creates a nice tension. Good stuff.

[hack]

A small flower crushed by jackboots.
It is good Hawk.

[Hawkman]

Hi B/V and thanks for your reading and comment. The mention of the solution is a deliberate reference to the fact that many of the artists who performed in those Berlin night clubs were victims. Some were Jewish and were routed to the camps, sometimes via Theresienstadt. Others were gay, lesbian, or left wing. All subversive to the Nazis and treated accordingly. The phrase I'm most uneasy about is "... cigarette chests" as I'm not sure how this will be interpreted. Does it make sense?

Thanks hack. Your approval is always heartening.

Live long and prosper - H

PS I'm a huge Kurt Weill fan.