ET DIMITTE NOBIS DEBITA NOSTRA

BLACK FLOWERS FOR A GERMAN SOLDIER

(HISTORICAL FICTION WRITTEN IN POETIC PROSE STYLE.ENGLISH TRANSLATION BY MYSELF)

Warsaw ,Autumn 1938

I never knew why.We used to be so intimate friends,so close,so confident between us!

I still remember the day I met you: it was raining in Berlin and I sat down in the cafe placed at the Friedrichstrasse, shivering, rubbing my hands all over a steaming cup, while listening to the chatter of the parishioners.

I was in my w ay to Vienna. It con stituted a very important step for my career :I was conscious that my whole future depended on it, but I didn't let pass the opportunity to visit Germany.

I eagerly needed to know Berlin.

"Oh,ja!Because of Beethoven", you said.

Yes, of course,it was due to Beethoven, but also due to everything that was said about the "new Reich 's capital" all around the world,It was rumoured that the reconstruction of the country, after the injust robbery of Versailles, had been prodigious, admirable.

When I put the emphasis on this detail, your childsih, good,incredibly pure hazel eyes lit up in a strange way, acquiring shades of gray and silver:

_"HE" was who made that miracle ,in the name of our people, so often humiliated.

And then you got entangled in a long eulogy of your beloved Führer, as if he were dead, as if he were a living dead one wearing an almost intangible crown.

You took me to Tiergarten one the next day: you pointed at the children, playing in a circle , imitating the gestures of the elderly.

The evening fell showing us a gloss of browned light.The smell of pines was blueing the air: it was pure perfume and resin.

The bog in which I was staying could see our hands,entangled together , approaching the fire, beautiful and cheerful, as in the verses of the Poverello of Assisi.It exploded in sparks and butterflies and flowers and all that one is able to see and appreciate when ( like you and I then) is only twenty years old.

The next day in the morning I left, after crossing Alexanderplatz with you ( and you looked suspiciously silent) ,bfore going to get on board my train to Vienna at eleven o'clock .

And I never saw you again ,except in those photographs that were accompanying the letters we crossed for five long years.

You looked always tall, erect, dressed in the uniform of the Wehrmacht: proud of your people, and absolutely love with your "New Germany".

I returned to Warsaw recently.And then I heard the news.

I never knew why, until this morning, when I could observe the silhouettes of steel passing through the gates of the city.

They were like an avalanche of ominous flowers ,running slowly across the avenue; like dark, terrible bunches..They were arranged like an obscure premonition,like a bloody,furious omen.

And then I understood why you chose to bite the barrel of your gun,of your beloved Luger45 ,the same one you had wielded so often proudly.

I couldn't do more than to resign, giv ing a last .furtive glance at your photographs :they were like fogged memories of a lost hope....................................................................................................................................................................................................................

Auschwitz, 1944

The sound of the sirens announce the latest hour of this endless afternoon..

When they call us for to go into the showers I have an indescribable feeling.

As if I were about to see you again.As if I were walking back into that old cafe at the Friedrichstrasse.

I don't know ....

The smell is penetrating.IT isn't the perfumethe aroma of that distant time: This is.... something else.

The bouquet of black flowers is still on the table, and a melody sounds again.It comes from the the blind old man's accordion.

The steamy pictures come alive.

Yes.

Now I know I'll see you once more.

And, again, I ,myself,closing my eyes,finally know that that I'm here to expect.