home page





Search our ZP Website   

newsletter

Subscribe me to the Free Online Newsletter for Western Socially Engaged Buddhism


Ways to Support Us!







Thank you for supporting the work of the Zen Peacemakers!


ZEN HOUSES (ZH)
   Appalachia: 1st ZH
   Montague Farm: Mother House ZH

RESIDENT PROGRAM

Bearing Witness Retreats
Auschwitz Retreat
Street Retreats

Symposium for
Socially Engaged Buddhism


To Locate a ZPS Affiliate Group in Your Area
Link Here.

We hope you enjoy reading this article.
Please link here to subscribe to our free Newsletter on Socially Engaged Buddhism.

Out of the Darkness
by Julian Marshall

julian_marshall

Source

‘Out of the Darkness’ would probably not exist if it were not for my reading the remarkable book, Bearing Witness, by Bernie Glassman. In this book, Glassman writes with compelling conviction about leading Zen retreats at the site of the Auschwitz death camp. One might well wonder why anyone would want to spend several days immersing themselves in a site of true human hell. Glassman’s point is that in bearing witness to the suffering of our human condition, a healing can take root; that in becoming wakeful, to the best of our ability, to the full range of our human experience, we might begin to birth a deeper wisdom, a wider inclusivity. In his own words, ‘to recognise ourselves and others as manifestations of Oneness, Diversity and Harmony’. My piece is a dedicated ‘Amen’ to this possibility.

In November 2008 I stumbled across the poetry and letters of Gertrud Kolmar and was at once struck by what a remarkable woman and poet she was. During World War II she lived in Berlin, taking care of her ageing father until in 1943, following his deportation to a concentration camp, she herself was deported to Auschwitz, where she was murdered. Yet her writings suggest that even in the darkest of circumstances she was able to meet her fate with a stoic equanimity.

Her poetry is strikingly full of life – colour, vibrancy, deep sensation – and her poem, ‘Aus dem Dunkel’ (Out Of The Darkness), is surely one of the most beautiful. Written in 1937 the poem evokes powerful, dream-like images of crumbling and decay – serving as an eerie foretelling of the imminent tidal wave of horror about to hit the world.
Deeply moved by this poem I decided to set Out Of The Darkness as a cantata for chamber choir, mezzo soprano soloist and two cellos. To begin with, I imagined that I would settle on a musical language that might somehow ‘meet the darkness’ in the poem. But as I began to compose, quite different stylistic voices seemed to suggest themselves. Influences of Tango and Bossa Nova, as well as more abstract ideas, all seemed ironically appropriate! The result is a cantata of about thirty-five minutes.

I have been asked if I consider Out Of The Darkness a ‘holocaust’ piece. My answer is both yes and no. It is, in as much as the text is, of course, deeply imbedded historically in European and Jewish social context. It is also, however, for me, important to approach the piece in a broader context: as an enquiry into the critical issues of freedom and constraint that have relevance for so many today.

Form

Out Of The Darkness is divided into seven sections – including an off-stage Prologue. The sixth, River, features the line, ‘Far off, the river speaks with its banks’, but is also the only section with text not from Kolmar’s poem but from two Sephardic ballads – La Serena and A La Nana. I have allowed myself this poetic licence as River allows a brief time for reflection away from the journey of the main text. And why Spanish? Well, Kolmar was a linguist; the Jewish culture is multinational, and the words are not only incredibly beautiful – but also, in the case of A La Nana, painfully ironic:

A La Nana

A la nana, a la buba,                                    Lullaby, baby,
Se durma la criatura,                                    May the child sleep.

 

El Dio grande que los guarde                           May great God guard them,
A los niños de los males.                           Keep the children from evil.                 

La Serena

Si la mar era de leche                                    If the sea were milk;
Los barquitos de canela                           the little boats of cinnamon,
Yo me mancharia entera                           I would immerse myself entirely,
Por salvar la mi bandiera.                           To save my flag.

(Translations: Krysia Howard)

 (Julian Marshall, August 2009)

Here is Kolmar’s extraordinary poem:

Out of The Darkness        

Out of the darkness I come, a woman,
I carry a child, but no longer know whose;
Once I knew it.
But now no man is for me anymore . . . .
They all have trickled away like rivulets,
Gulped up by the earth.
I continue on my way.
For I want to reach the mountains before daybreak,
and the stars are beginning to fade.

Out of the darkness I come.
Through dusky alleys I wandered alone,
When, suddenly, a charging light’s talons tore the soft blackness,
The wild cat, the hind,
And  doors flung open wide, disgorged ugly screams, wild howls,
beastly roar.
Drunkards wallowed….
I shook all this from the hem of my dress along the way.

I traversed the deserted marketplace.
Leaves floated in puddles, reflecting the moon.
Haggard, hungry dogs sniffed the refuse on the cobblestones.
Trampled fruit rotted away,
An old man in rags tormented wretched strings with his play
And sang with a thin, discordant, plaintive voice
Unheard.
Once, these fruits ripened in sun and dew,
Dreaming still of the fragrance and bliss of the loving bloom,
But the wailing beggar
Had long forgotten and knew nothing but hunger and thirst.

Before the castle of the mighty I halted,
And as I set foot upon the lowest step,
The flesh-red porphyry burst cracking under my sole.-
I turned
And looked up at the plain window, the late candle of the thinker,
He pondered and pondered, never finding his query’s resolve,
And to the shaded little lamp of the infirm, who still did not learn,
How he should die.
Under the arch of the bridge
Two ghastly skeletons fought over gold.
I lifted up my poverty as a grey shield before my face
And passed unimperiled.

Far off, the river speaks with its banks.

And now, I struggle along a rocky, cumbersome path.
Fallen rocks, thorny bushes wound my blind, searching hands:
A cave awaits,
Its deepest chasm a shelter for the metal-green raven
    who has no name.
There I shall enter,
Under the aegis of those huge, shadowing wings, I shall
    crouch down and rest.
Somnolent, I shall listen to my child’s mute, growing word,
And sleep, my face turned toward the East, until sunrise

                                                                        -Gertrud Kolmar

Reprinted from Kolmar, Gertrude. My Gaze is Turned Inward: Letters 1934-1943. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2004. English translation reprinted with permission.

If you want to get in touch with me to ask me about any aspect of my work, you can reach me at: julian@wigglylines.co.uk