Fanny-Min Becker - Two Poems

Saw him last at a school festival
Vowed we would look him up again
Found him in the Wild Thief Kneipe*
With his accordion upon a high stool

Audience frolicking in beer glasses
Seeking relief in saucy jokes
Igor's fingers danced from waltz to polka
And for us a Petite Fleur and chansons

During the break he told us
Between many a cigarette puff
Fifteen years in the Don Ensemble he was
Before swept off by the Democratic Flood

He found his way to Wild Thief
Earns enough D-Marks for sending
To wife and teenage children
And a once-a-year trip home

As we left him he started playing
A gentle Russian melody
Spinning melancholic magic
Above the joyous beery foam

I saw him first at Dreieck*,
In a heavy overcoat,
On a bright summer's day,
Some eight years ago.

He came to greet me,
A new-comer to his town,
With warm hands, 
And very warm eyes.

Then he could still tell  
Japan from Hong Kong,
Or Hong Kong from China, 
And had a book in his hand.

I saw him next sitting at the bus-stop,
With a plain roll in one hand,
In the other an old newspaper 
Fished out of the litter stand.

We moved away from that place,
And I lost track of him for long.
By chance I once from afar
Spotted him strolling down town.  

His coat had lost its splendour.
He was weighed down by a load
Of four old bagfuls of whatsoever,
I wonder if he had seen me.

He was first heading my way,
Then suddenly turned away.
He dashed into a side street,
I waved and called in vain...

One Saturday noon last summer,
Saw him in his half torn coat, 
Listening to a street singer, 
While emptying cans and bottles.

Then he was there again at Dreieck,
On a bench without his coat.
Singing with foam in his mouth,
To the autumn sun above. 

I last saw him one wintry morning 
at the Red Cross clothes depot
With more bags and bottles
And a new thin overcoat