the singing knives

PETER LORRE

László Löwenstein

Le Chiffre / Climax! Casino Royale (1954)

Sorry I was not the one you needed.

And you were never mine.”

In the first edition of Kafka’s diaries, this line was censored by Max Brod, who changed it to “Zwei schöne schwedische Jungen mit langen Beinen” (two handsome Swedish boys with long legs).

WELCOME If you believe nothing is always what's left after a while, as I did, If you believe you have this collection of ungiven gifts, as I do (right here behind the silence and the averted eyes) If you believe an afternoon can collapse into strange privacies, which it has— how in your backyard, for example, the shyness of flowers can be suddenly overwhelming, and in the distance the clear goddamn of thunder personal, like a voice If you believe there's no correct response to death, as I do, If you believe that in grief there are small corners of joy (where I have sat making plans) If your body sometimes is a light switch in a house of insomniacs, If you can feel yourself straining to be yourself every waking minute, If, as I am, you are almost smiling...

In the wind that lifts the harbor litter Wet against my fingers in a dream Salvaging among the tideline's bitter gleanings Generous Exigent Lush and lean

Your voice A tune I thought I had forgotten The taste of cold July brook on my tongue A fire built on thick ice in the winter The place where lost and salvaged meet and fit The cadences a class in grief is taught in The sound when frozen rivers start to run