Reto Weber

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Warmer than the Sun

A Fire Burns

She stretches out her arms.
Her hands toward the fire.
The warmth pricks.
Her pores widen.
The backs of her hands cold.
She turns, warms her back.
Her face grows cold.
She turns minute by minute.
Minute after minute.
If the fire is warm enough, the dervish becomes a phoenix.
Warmer, higher.
He sheds his clothes and dances toward the sky.
Today the fire is small.
So the spinning top stands still.
Like a small stone in the river of time.
Ground down and worn away, crouched on the earth.
The wood too far away.
The fire out.
Bent beneath the weight of the world.
Still and afraid.
She waits for the end.
Until she passes into the eternal cold.

She remembers hope.
Her grandma told her of warmth.
With a voice both serious and playful
she spoke of the old magic:

Child, the sun gives warmth.
But not justly.
It shines more on the rich
and leaves us poor ones cold.
We freeze and long for wealth.
For a life on the warm plains.
But WE have a treasure
within us that the rich do not have.
The warmth is in us.
The rich are bronzed
by the sun, yet their hearts are cold.
Many of our hearts in the valleys are cold as well.
But some of us have the warmth.
Few girls like you
get to know their grandma.
We are too old, too weak.
We old ones are sent to the streams.
"Die there and go into the lap of Mother Cold."
I was told again and again:
"Old woman, go away."
"Can't you see, you need too much warmth?"
"Can't you see, you are a burden?"
They spoke and still speak to me that way.
Yet they do not see the source of my warmth.
Child, do you want to know the secret?
Do you want to hear of the true source?
Do you want to learn of warmth without fire?

The child nodded with wide eyes and looked into the old woman's worn face.

The warmth is in you.

She presses her unkempt fingernails gently against the girl's chest.

What the rich do not have,
a heart of warmth.
You have the warmth.
You need do nothing.
You will be warm.
It takes faith, but faith alone is not enough.
It takes trust, but trust alone is not enough.
The Warmer lives in you.
He has accomplished everything.
One day he will come again, and then everyone will be given a new heart.
A heart that warms everyone.
The sun will pass away.
You. You already have this heart now.

She smiled at the girl.
Turned around again with a groan and went back to the fire.

The girl back in the present.
Back in the body of a woman.
Everything still cold.
Still on the ground.
Yet the warmth spreads within her.
Gooseflesh shivers over her arms
and in the sky she sees the sun rise.
She sees that this was not the last night.

Senseless

The last months were hard.
She remembers a man.
He drew her close.
To his arm and warmed her.
Their hearts warmed.
They touched.
He entered her and she received.
He vanished and she remained.
Life grew inside her.
But she is alone.
So she set out.
Toward her grandma's city.
She followed the old tradition.
Women give birth with their mother.
But she does not know her mother.
Remembers only her grandma.
So she goes to the city of her forebears.
So she hopes for her grandma,
that she is still alive,
that she will help her give birth.

And so she wanders through the gloomy valley.
The sun shines only briefly.
There is barely enough time
to prepare for the next night.
To gather wood.
But when you are traveling,
you need shelter.
Last night there was not enough time
and she almost went into the lap of the cold.
Tonight she has to make it.
The city is not far away.
She has seen it for days.
But only a few kilometers
day after day can she manage.
She sees the city, yet knows for certain
that it is still far too far away.
But she hopes.
Her heart is warm.

She builds huts like the shepherds.
The first step: find a natural hollow.
The next: use the material at hand.
The wood has already been burned.
Stones and clods of earth remain,
piled up for protection.
Lined with moss.
Success depends on the shape of the valley.
On how long the daylight lasts.
Success depends on the richness of the surroundings.
Success depends on the skill and luck to find.

But this day was better.
So she found only a little wood,
but enough to eat
and a cave sheltered from the wind.
So she will see the next day after all.

The sun is already slowly setting.
So the poor are left with time for themselves.
Thoughts, prayers, songs, and despair.
When despair is great, the cold is near.
It invites you.

Come to me.
You need go on no longer.
Everything is over.
My arms will quietly carry you into sleep.

But all who believed in doubt have passed away.
Peacefully and eternally.
But she lives.
She is still warm.
Her heart beats.
So she sings:

She sings softly.
Softly.
Her lips barely move.
The melody in her head; in her breath.
Yet the warmth of the songs sinks deep into the heart.
So she sings the Book of Songs again.
So she sings and warms the child's heart.

Hope on the horizon.
A city where people warm themselves together.
No odorless cold.
Only stinking warmth.
The stench of life.
How she longs for the sweat of others.
For warm dung.
It warms.
And when it is burned, it warms again.

She is tired of smelling nothing.
The cold robs the senses.
Her fingers numb.
No smell.
Like deafness and tinnitus.
Everything gray.
No life. No sounds except the wind.
No touch, no injury, no scar, no penetration, no life.

Death and Manure

Arrived in the city.
The city of promise.
Grandma had told her that the Bringer of Warmth comes from there.
But the story is old
and hope weak.
The Book of Songs sings of him.
They sing of a king.
Of a shepherd.
Of one who sets things right.
They sing that he will be beaten.
That he will triumph.
That he will die.
That his kingdom remains eternaly.

The great stench of the city brought her senses back to life.
She looks for a place to stay.
Where is Grandma?
She asks after old women.
She describes her as well as she remembers,
but beyond "old woman" the listeners hear nothing.
The city is searched quickly.
There are few old people.
There is an old people's home.
A hospice.
There old people are allowed to die with dignity.
There are herbal healers there.
The old are led to Mother Cold.
Calmed with mushrooms and laid into the cold,
the Mother embraces them and takes them to herself.

So she goes to the place of rest.
Looks for her grandma.
All the old ones, few of them even fifty,
lie there laid out in peace.
So they remain and do not decay.
In the city: decay and stench.
Out here: the eternal nothingness.

She walks through the rows of laid-out elders.
She has already seen many thawed bodies.
She looked into the faces.
Mostly peaceful.
She has to realize she no longer knows what her grandma looks like.
So she goes back into the city.

Maybe she is still alive?

She goes into the city.
Out in nature there had been food, but no fire.
Here there is fire, but hardly any food.
So she needs money.
She offers her services.
She mends many a dress.
She outfits many a man.
Enough for food.
Not enough for a bed.
So she sleeps on the street.
But a woman alone on the street?
That is exactly how her child was conceived.
She is young and wounded.
Yet marked and hardened.
So she knows how to hide
and endures these times as well.

The day draws nearer,
and she still has no money for shelter.
She asks for a place to stay,
but where are they supposed to put her?
She finds no place.
And if she does, none that is safe.
Slower and slower.
Her belly presses. Grows hard.
Her breathing heavy.
Her belly strains and she breathes.
She knows pain.
Ah, comforting pain.
Thank you, you show me that I am.
There is nothing she fears.
She slips into a manure pit.
It is warm there and she is safe.

The Great Stretching

She will give birth alone.
But warm.
The child will not be alone.
And warm.

The screams from the manure pit are lost in the general noise.
Many are screaming.
She is nothing special.
Does not stand out.

She is exhausted.
Her thoughts circle:

Where is the man?
Where is Grandma?
Why am I alone?
I can't do this.
The child will die.
I will die.
I hope the child dies too if I die.

I do not want this.
I cannot do this.

She falls asleep.
She wakes up: pain

Everything closes.
Everything narrows.
The child stretches.
The struggle begins.
The child wins.

I can do nothing.
I am nothing.
The warmth is there.

A warm birth.
What more could one want.

The warmth is in my heart.
I am not cold.
The child may come.
The child may kill me.
I surrender and trust you: Father of Light.

A child is born.
A woman has become.

Warmer than Manure

Outside there are shepherds.
They can stay there.
Their small livestock eats moss.
Their small livestock gives warmth.
So the dung is collected, dried, sold.

Among the shepherds there is warmth.
Among the shepherds there is rest.
They are the bearers of the teaching.
They tell stories, for they see much.
They travel from city to city, because the animals warm them.

So one night they dreamed.
The Father of Light, surrounded by servants of fire.
They sang the song from the Book of Songs.

A child is born to you.
Smeared in manure, wrapped in rags.
The child of light.
The child of warmth.

The shepherds woke, spoke without restraint.
Were astonished by the dream.
Felt the warmth in their hearts.
Wanted to see the manure-child.
So they went back into the city.

The moss had already been grazed bare.
But one or two animals may die for this hope.
Their hearts stayed warm.
They entered the city and found the child.
In manure and rags.
They knelt down.

The woman kept it all deep in her heart.
She rejoiced.
She warmed herself at the shepherds' joy and began to hope.
To hope that the child will live.

Light Entrails

On the plain the sun shines.
On the plain it is warm.
They are called the rich.
But "warm ones" would be more accurate.
The plain is full.
Ruled by an iron hand.
So no more people are allowed onto the plain.
Whoever does not have enough must go into the cold.
If a rich man has many children, then just as many warm ones must go into the cold.
The iron hand lies heavy.
The iron hand tolerates no second.
The commons is as healthy as the iron hand is strong.

Then there came a scholar in the lore of entrails.
She reads the future from entrails.
An ancient art.
An ancient magic.
Without Father of Light or Mother Cold.
So she goes from corpse to corpse.
Desecrates and sees.
Questions herself and sees.
"A feather hand is born."
"A good shepherd who tends us on the plain."
"He brings warmth to the cold and cold to the warm."

Another dog slit open.
It is clear.

So she goes to the iron fist.
She asks:

Where is the feather hand?

He says:

I am the iron fist.
I know of no feather hand.
Visit it and come back.
I want to pay it homage.

So she went and found the child.
She gave it royal gifts.
Went back, but not through the plain:
A messenger of Light forbade it.

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