Children, that’s what a man needs – children, who know nothing about it.
An accordion player posted himself at the curb and played La Paloma. The rug peddlers appeared with silken Keshans over their shoulders. A boy sold pistachios at the tables. It looked as it had always looked – until the newspaper boys came. The papers were almost torn from their hands and a few seconds later the terrace, with all the unfolded papers, appeared as if buried under a swarm of huge, white, bloodless moths sitting on their victims greedily, with noiseless flapping wings.
In this way the squad has merely made the turn-about and a couple of paces, while the squad-leader dashes backwards and forwards like a fart on a curtain-pole.
Katczinsky is right when he says it would not be such a bad war if only one could get a little more sleep.
Here I sit and there you are lying; we have so much to say, and we shall never say it.
It is a strange thing that all the memories have these two qualities. They are always full of quietness, that is the most striking thing about them; and even when things weren’t like that in reality, they still seem to have that quality. They are soundless apparitions, which speak to me by looks and gestures, wordless and silent – and their silence is precisely what disturbs me.
When it is fairly quiet we can hear the transports behind the enemy lines rolling ceaselessly until dawn. Kat says that they do not go back but are bringing up troops – troops, munitions, and guns.
If only they would not look at one so-What great misery can be in two such small spots, no bigger than a man’s thumb-in their eyes!
I glance at my boots. They are big and clumsy, the breeches are tucked into them, and standing up one looks well-built and powerful in these great drainpipes. But when we go bathing and strip, suddenly we have slender legs again and slight shoulders. We are no longer soldiers but little more than boys; no one would believe that we could carry packs.
He pointed to the sky in which Mars twinkled above the darkening roofs, large and red. “Yes, and they say that that fellow up there is closer to our earth than he has been for many years.” He laughed. “Soon we’ll read that somewhere a child has been born with a mole like a sword. And that it was raining blood somewhere else. The only thing missing now is the enigmatic comet of the Middle Ages to make all the ominous signs complete.
There behind me on the stretchers my comrades are now lying and still they call. It is peace, yet they must die. But I, I am trembling with joy and am not ashamed. – And that is odd. Because none can ever wholly feel what another suffers – is that the reason why wars perpetually recur? 2.
He looked at me sideways. “You mean, and then mixed things up a bit? Never apologise. Never talk. Send flowers. No letter. Only flowers. They cover up everything. Even graves.
Now time is standing still. We’ve torn it in two. Now only we two are here; we two, you and me and no one else.
What’s going on outside, Ravic?” “Nothing new, Kate. The world goes on eagerly preparing for suicide and at the same time deluding itself about what it’s doing.” “Will there be war?” “Everyone knows that there will be war. What one does not yet know is when. Everyone expects a miracle.” Ravic smiled. “Never before have I seen so many politicians who believe in miracles as at present.
But you will understand me anyways, even without words. Everything is so new to me that I cannot express it; I didn’t know that my breathe could love, that my nails could love, that even my death could love. And I don’t care how much it will last, or whether I can hold it or not, or whether I will be able to express it properly.
Ce qu’on laisse approcher, on veut le retenir. Et on ne peut rien retenir.
How various is a face; but an hour ago it was strange and it is now touched with a tenderness that comes, not from it, but from out of the night, the world and the blood, all these things seem to shine in it together.
While they taught that duty to one’s country is the greatest thing, we already knew that death-throes are stronger.
It brings a lump into the throat to see how they go over, and run and fall. A man would like to spank them, they are so stupid, and to take them by the arm and lead them away from here where they have no business to be. They wear grey coats and trousers and boots, but for most of them the uniform is far too big, it hangs on their limbs, their shoulders are too narrow, their bodies too slight; no uniform was ever made to these childish measurements.
And this I know: all these things that now, while we are still in the war, sink down in us like a stone, after the war shall waken again, and then shall begin the disentanglement of life and death.