Kurt Schwitters: Poetry

Kurt Schwitters, Mai 191, 1921

One Day
by Kurt Schwitters

One day
You finish to be a boy.
But you play
Still with your old toy.
You like all the old angels
As you did before,
And think they are girls,
Beautiful girls.
You think they are like you
When you were young
But you are old,
And die and get cold.
           
(written in English, circa 1946-7; After his exile from Germany, Schwitters renounced his native tongue, henceforth speaking and writing in English. Schwitters died in 1948)



The Meadow
by Kurt Schwitters

The meadow does grow. O woe to the man hiding meadows inside him. For how would it grow? I sure wouldn't know how a meadow could grow. And big arp wouldn't either. For grass does grow stalks. And meadow lifts stalks unto sky. And wind bloweth winds. Stalk tremors for joy. Sun shines through the grass. Sky mirrors my blue. And earthsmell wafts fragrances. Who could know how to grow? Who would know from a meadow? I dream meadows pra.

(1920-21, translation Jerome Rothenberg)

Kurt Schwitters, Miss Blanche, 1923

Private Gentlemen, Attention Please! (poem 29)
by Kurt Schwitters

Stealing is prohibited here, the occupant is a member of the civil defense. The power formation of a situation is in the grasping, as Noske proves. Today Ann received the following in Weimar: From the National Assembly of Piecemeal. As first formation of a serious situation weapons poisoned all. For he, who her, who here hear da da, goldens Glotea, (Dissolution of the family fathers.)

(1919, translation Pierre Joris)

Kurt Schwitters, Die Fruhlingstur (The Spring Door), 1938

The Great Ardor of Dada: A Funeral March
by Kurt Schwitters

Ardor bleeds Ardors bleed blood. Merz greening tempest, charge at the clocks. The churchtower rises a pervert clawing of claws (it goes without saying). Claws on top claws, pervert, claws; smackeroo. Blamm. Do slosh fish rumble lama guck (it’s a Kaiser’s Day special!) fish do unleaf itself deep inside slowly sea zeppelins … Rages, rages, rages - sea raging fish, airs, zeppelin. The turtledove drops drops (where?), drops skim stash halfway up (O Anna Blossom, my lovely miss, did you ever read anything like this?). My corpse is too large, in the night - crumbles, crumbles, crumbles - too large is my corpse. Waters whip unsoftened valley - crumbles, crumbles, crumbles - too large is my corpse, giants arch dome into crumbs - crumbles, crumbles, crumbles, my corpse is too large, Cagliostro’s shroud - crumbles crumbles crumbles - my corpse is too large, for the orphanage alms-for-the-poor - crumbles crumbles crumbles - too large is my corpse…


(1921, translation Pierre Joris & Jerome Rothenberg from Roland Schacht's French version and Kurt Schwitters' original German) 

Kurt Schwitters, For Kate, 1947

Dumb Poem
by Kurt Schwitters

A worm hangs from a fishhook.
A fish bites the worm.
The fish also bites the fishhook.
The hook pulls the fish.
Now the fish hangs from the hook.
The hook swings it through the air.
The fish drops dead in the air.
The hook drops the fish dead.
A new worm hangs from the fishhook.
A new fish bites the new worm.
And new life blossoms out among the ruins.

(1922, translation Jerome Rothenberg)


If I Were, When I Was
by Kurt Schwitters

Untimely gropes without space      The I in the Everywhere You From Morning-Evening-Evening-Morning      toward the next self-consciousness.
From the eternally Old it came,      As I;      Always growing without degree or measure      It remains in the I.
Soon smaller-larger, up-back      In the You the I, in the I the You.      You are like I,      Your I you are,     like I.
Thus we travel in the Nothing      Unevenly different and differently the same      Uneven evenness (Variable parable) of the millions      Me-Thee, Thee-Me: the same way.      Always believing everyone fulfills his duty,      Always faithful to the call within;      The hope that we may unite ourselves,      Remains unsevered.      We live, because we can remember,      And go on living, because we hope.      Time is change all around us,      Space is Cover.
We are the measure,      For Time and eternally,      infinite Space.
We grope, because we know,      If we were, when we were.

(1935, translation Pierre Joris)

see more Merz covers & pages

my poem Kurt Schwitters in Exile
why Kurt Schwitters is my hero