The forced march
from concentration camp
to concentration camp
from finally
Flohan to Terezin
the day before
- the war ends.
His soul is strong
the body weakened.
"Do you know Robert Desnos..."
"I am Robert Desnos..."
They recognise him
from his Man Ray photo.
Death allows him
the grace to die
as himself
once more
not this
nameless number
an animal.
He holds a rose
they've given him.
He holds on to it
even when it dies.
Refusing to let go
of a beauty
he can hold
he can touch.
His 'head full of
transformations."
The alchemy of thought.
As if a world
could be created
recreated
from it.
This rose is
cremated with him.
He is that
"unthinkable" thing
" a soul
without a body"
a dream
of words.
I speak him
to remember him
into being.
Leçons de ténèbres, literally translated lessons of darkness, is a genre of French baroque music which developed from the polyphonic lamentations settings for the tenebrae service of Renaissance composers such as Sermisy, Gesualdo, Tallis, and Tomás Luis de Victoria into virtuoso solo chamber music.
The tenebrae service uses the text of the Lamentations of Jeremiah, originally deploring the Siege of Jerusalem (587 BC) and subsequent desolation of the city, but applied allegorically to the three days of mourning for Christ between his crucifixion and resurrection.
https://youtu.be/4C8yLai1tHw
Les Ténèbres and Ténèbres, o Ténèbres are poems by Robert Desnos.
***
Early 1945. In the Czech town of Terezín, a group of prisoners are taken out of their barracks and loaded into a truck. The prisoners are silent, knowing the fate that awaits them; they are on their way to the gas chambers. Soon they arrive and are unloaded from the truck. Silently, they begin to move toward the gas chamber, the mood crushed under the weight of knowing what is inevitable. Even the guards are silent, having sent countless others down the same long walk.
Suddenly, a man jumps out of line. In an animated manner, he grabs the hand of the person in front of him and begins to read their palm. He says he sees lines for a long life, many grandchildren, and abundant joy. Soon, a person nearby offered his palm, and again the soothsayer forecasts success, happiness, and a long life. The other prisoners come to life, eagerly thrusting their palms towards the man, and for each of them he foresees long and happy lives.
The guards become confused. They have no idea what to make of this, even less of an idea of what to do. Their assignment is routine; they know the outcome and so did the prisoners. The man, a prisoner much like all the ones before that they had sent to their deaths, is crossing some line for them. The palm reader is creating a new reality; he is changing what everyone knew. He is so effective that the guards no longer have the will to go through with the executions. When faced with the stark proof that the people they were taking to their deaths were in fact living, and loving beings, they flinch. They order the prisoners back onto the truck and took them back to the barracks.