We’re here, still

Okapi is reading, deeply absorbed in a colorful linen-bound book. Zebra approaches curiously. -What's new? What are you reading?

Okapi, emerging from the text with a disordered blink, lowers the book and slowly folds it closed. Not without putting the shiny ribbon between the pages first.

-I actually read something extraordinary, and also really beautiful, after horrifically somber lines. Earlier I was looking for passages in a story I was thinking about the other day, and I found them. Well-set and unfortunately apt.

After a little pause, it declaims in an ominous voice:

-If we had thought that horror could no longer escalate, we now had to realize that there’s no limit to atrocities that people are inflicting on each other; that we find ourselves capable of savaging the other's guts, cracking his brains, searching for ultimate torment. I say 'we', and of all the 'we’s' I've come to, it's this one that’s tormenting me the most.

Zebra's gaze is blank. For a few seconds, it seems to expect the text to continue. Since nothing comes, it raises its head questioningly. -Cassandra? And? What now?

-While searching in the library earlier, I also found this book. A chance find, so to speak. As if there were such a thing.

It hands the book to Zebra. Zebra opens it, thanks to the ribbon that lies between the pages like a golden thread.

You’re here, still?

Throw your fear

into the air

Soon

your time is over

soon

heaven grows

under the grass

your dreams fall

into nowhere

Still

the carnation smells sweetly

the thrush sings

still you may love

give words away

you are here, still

Be what you are

Give what you have

Rose Ausl?nder, translated by Julia K. Stein.

First quote from Christa Wolf: Kassandra. Luchterhand, 1993. My translation.