the common wince of a makeshift heaven

presumes me

   Paul Celan lived his final years at 6 Avenue Emile Zola. This address is within sight of Pont Mirabeau, the bridge from which he threw himself into the Seine sometime near the end of April, 1970.

   During a visit in the fall of 2002 I decided I would retrace his final steps: from earth to water, from speech to silence, from time to oblivion. Two hundred and sixty steps is the distance between such things. I stopped on the bridge when I heard ‘stop’ in a mix of German, French, Romanian, and Hebrew. But there are two sides to every bridge, upstream and downstream. Being a soul ravaged by history it was obvious to me that he would take leave of history by looking back, that is, by looking upstream— at Paris, and further on into the Europe that was his home and the Europe that destroyed him. he would let the river carry him ‘north of the future’.

   I read a poem at my feet and then I placed a chestnut on the handrail. I closed my eyes and looked for the place where time is unable to penetrate. I pushed the chestnut over, into that place.

I heard something say thank you… I am not sure what it was. I think it was everything.

w

where the sky has been shed

by a heaven that has crawled

elsewhere

it is not enough to dream

tunnels beneath the night