The German poet and artist Arne Rautenberg visited me in Edinburgh recently. We read together at the Goethe Institut Glasgow, and at the Edinburgh Bookshop – along with Peter Manson, presenting his fine Mallarmé translations – so thanks to everyone who came on those evenings.

I made some new translations for the readings, of poems from Arne’s most recent book, Mundfauler Staub (Taciturn Dust). This is a translation of ‘abspann’.

Credits

the man: my grandfather
the woman: my grandmother
the child: my mother
war

the man: my father
the woman: my mother
the child: me
reconstruction

the man: me
the woman: my wife
the child: my daughter
happiness

Arne and I, accompanied by Angus Reid, also walked part of the Fife Coastal Path, between Kirkcaldy and Aberdour.