[PEN-L:32924] Re: Re: Re: Re: : United Airlines and market socialism

[andie nachgeborenen <andie_nachgeborenen@xxxxxxxxx>]

--- ken hanly <khanly@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Are we to understand that Andie is a reborn Justin?
> 
> Welcome back...
> 
> Cheers, Ken Hanly (yet to be born again anything)
> 
> P.S. What exactly does nachgeborenen mean?
> 
> 

Yes, it's me. An die Nachgeborenen means To Those Born
Later. It's the title of a Brecht poem that I like:

               To those born later 
                                                      
        I
                                                      
        Truly, I live in dark times!
                                                      
        The guileless word is folly. A smooth
                                                      
             forehead
                                                      
        Suggests insensitivity. The man who laughs
                                                      
        Has simply not yet heard
                                                      
        The terrible news.What kind of times are
                                                      
             they, when
                                                      
        A talk about trees is almost a crime
                                                      
        Because it implies silence about so many 
                                                      
             horrors?
                                                      
        That man there calmly crossing the street
                                                      
        Is already perhaps beyond the reach of his
                                                      
             friends
                                                      
        Who are in need?It is true I still earn my
                                                      
             keep
                                                      
        But, believe me, that is only an accident.
                                                      
             Nothing
                                                      
        I do gives me the right to eat my fill.
                                                      
        By chance I´ve been spared. (If my luck
                                                      
             breaks, I am lost.)They say to me: Eat
and
                                                      
             drink! Be glad you have it!
                                                      
        But how can I eat and drink if I snatch what
                                                      
             I eat
                                                      
        From the starving, and
                                                      
        My glass of water belongs to one dying of
                                                      
             thirst?
                                                      
        And yet I eat and drink.
                                                      
        I would also like to be wise.
                                                      
        In the old books it says what wisdom is: 
                                                      
        to shun the strife of the world and to live
                                                      
             out
                                                      
        Your brief time without fear
                                                      
        Also to get along without violence
                                                      
        To return good for evil
                                                      
        Not to fulfil your desires but to forget them
                                                      
        Is accounted wise.
                                                      
        All this I cannot do:
                                                      
        Truly, I live in dark times.

                                                      
        II
                                                      
        I came to the cities in a time of disorder
                                                      
        When hunger reigned there.
                                                      
        I came among men in a time of revolt
                                                      
        And I rebelled with them.
                                                      
        So passed my time
                                                      
        Which had been given to me on earth. My
                                                      
             food I ate beeween battles
                                                      
        To sleep I lay down among murderers
                                                      
        Love I practised carelessly
                                                      
        And nature I looked at without patience.
                                                      
        So passed my time
                                                      
        Which had been given to me on earth. All
                                                      
             roads led into the mire in my time.
                                                      
        My tongue betrayed me to the butchers.
                                                      
        There was little I could do. But those in
                                                      
             power
                                                      
        Sat safer without me: that was my hope.
                                                      
        So passed my time
                                                      
        Which had been given to me on earth. Our
                                                      
             forces were slight. Our goal
                                                      
        Lay far in the distance
                                                      
        It was clearly visible, though I myself
                                                      
        Was unlikely to reach it.
                                                      
        So passed my time
                                                      
        Which had beeen given to me on earth.

                                                      
        III
                                                      
        You who will emerge from the flood
                                                      
        In which we have gone under
                                                      
        Remember
                                                      
        When you speak of our failings
                                                      
        The dark time too
                                                      
        Which you have escaped.
                                                      
        For we went, changing countries oftener
                                                      
             than our shoes
                                                      
        Through the wars of the classes, despairing
                                                      
        When there was injustice only, and no
                                                      
             rebellion.
                                                      
        And yet we know: 
                                                      
        Hatred, even of meanness
                                                      
        Contorts the features.
                                                      
        Makes the voice hoarse. Oh, we
                                                      
        Who wanted to prepare the ground for
                                                      
             friendliness
                                                      
        Could not ourselves be friendly.
                                                      
        But you, when the time comes at last
                                                      
        And man is a helper to man
                                                      
        Think of us
                                                      
        With forebearance.

                                                      
        -- Translation by Michael Hamburger
                               

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