Militarization and Love

My grandmother says, Das Militär steckt in unserem Blut. My grandmother says, The military runs in our family. What is lost in translation is the word steckt. Hides, is stuck, is plugged. Somehow the military exists in our blood, lingering. The verb steckt suggests something active, positive or negative, but a presence nonetheless.

Separate

I don’t usually assign much spiritual significance to death, but on the 8th of December, when two friends and I went to Potsdam to explore an abandoned cemetery, taking a picture felt wrong. In an effort to make something from the experience or somehow preserve it, I sat down and wrote this poem.