For Celan

You wanted a word,
an apology from Heidegger
for the thousands upon thousands
of deaths at the mountain of death
but you received no answer:
No answer from God as well.
Why does golden hair Marguerite
have the stars all sparkling and
why does ashen hair Shulamith
shovel a grave in the air?
Why did the Germans shoot your mother?
Like Walter E Kurtz said in Apocalypse Now,
"Horror has a face… and you must make a friend of horror. Horror and moral
terror are your friends. If they are not, then they are enemies to be feared…"
Why does golden hair Marguerite
have the stars all sparkling and
why does ashen hair Shulamith
shovel a grave in the air?
Why did the Germans shoot your mother?
You wanted a word,
an apology from Heidegger
for the thousands upon thousands
of deaths at the mountain of death
but you received no answer:
No answer from God as well.

Jean Jones was born in Indonesia in 1964, received a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Poetry from Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio in 1988, and is currently co-editor of Word Salad Poetry Magazine, an online poetry magazine that can be found at the following website: http://wordsaladpoetrymagazine.com/drupal7/

Find more by Jean Jones in the Author Index.

Comment on this story in the Aphelion Forum

Return to Aphelion's Index page.