Monday 16 June 2008

Quartett


Valmont I thought your passion for me extinguished. Whence this sudden rekindling. And with such youthful violence. Too late in any case. You will no longer set my heart aflame. Not even once. Not anymore. I’m telling you this not without regret, Valmont. In any case there were minutes, perhaps should I say moments, a minute, that’s an eternity, where I was happy thanks to your company. I speak on my behalf, Valmont.What do I know of your feelings. And perhaps I should rather speak of minutes, in which I could use you for this, you, that was your capacity to feel something in the operation of my physiology, which seems in recollection to be a feeling of happiness. You haven’t forgotten how to operate this machine. Don’t take your hand away. Not that I would feel anything for you. It is my skin which remembers.

[by Heiner Mueller , 1980 ]
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4 comments:

xtina said...

Vollmond by Pina Bausch


O you, heavenly custodian
of oaths!
Turn your gaze
on my great grief,
see your everlasting guilt!
Hear my lament,
mighty god!
Through his most doughty deed,
that you rightly desired,
you sacrificed him
who wrought it
to the curse which had fallen on you:
this innocent had
to betray me
so that I should become a woman of wisdom!

Do I know now what is your will?

Everything, everything,
everything I know,
all is now clear to me!
I hear your ravens
stirring too;
with dreaded desired tidings
I now send them both home.
Rest, rest now, o god!

8 May 2011 at 23:21
xtina said...

(She signs to the vassals to lift Siegfried's
body on to the funeral pyre; at the same
time she removes the ring from Siegfried's
finger and gazes thoughtfully at it.)

Now I take up
my inheritance.
Accursed ring,
terrible ring,
I take your gold
and now I give it away.
Wise sisters
of the water's depths,
you swimming daughters of the Rhine,
I thank you for your good counsel.
I give you
what you crave:
from my ashes
take it for your own!
The fire that consumes me
shall cleanse the ring from the curse!
You in the water,
wash it away
and keep pure
the gleaming gold
that was disastrously stolen from you.

8 May 2011 at 23:22
xtina said...

(She has put on the ring
and now turns to the funeral pyre
on which Siegfried's body lies
stretched. She snatches from
one of the vassals a huge torch,)
(swings it and points towards
the background.)

Fly home, you ravens!
Recount to your master
what you have heard here by the Rhine!
Pass
by Brünnhilde's rock:
direct Loge, who still
blazes there, to Valhalla;
for the end of the gods
is nigh.
Thus do I throw this torch
at Valhalla's vaulting towers.

8 May 2011 at 23:23
xtina said...

(She hurls the torch into the pile of wood,
which quickly bursts into flame. Two ravens
fly up from the rock by the shore
and disappear into the background.)
(Brünnhilde catches sight of her horse,
which two young men lead in. She runs
towards it, takes hold of it and quickly
unbridles it: then leans towards it
confidentially)

Grane, my steed,
greetings!
Do you too know, my friend,
where I am leading you?
Radiant in the fire,
there lies your lord,
Siegfried, my blessed hero.
Are you neighing for joy
to follow your friend?
Do the laughing flames
lure you to him?
Feel my bosom too,
how it burns;
a bright fire
fastens on my heart
to embrace him,
enfolded in his arms,
to be one with him
in the intensity of love!
Heiajoho! Grane!
Greet your master!
Siegfried! Siegfried! See!
Your wife joyfully greets you!

8 May 2011 at 23:23

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