HOTEL BUSINESS

In cheap Berlin hotels run by Russians

there are no candies in the lobby and in the rooms—of course—

no envelopes with the hotel’s logo,

tubs yellow with age

hide fish and scorpions,

the frequent guests have seen life

and have many tales to tell before they collapse

on the bed with their liquor and old cigarette holders.

While they talk and chew the sliced ham

bought in the store across the street,

the ash from their cigarettes falls on the bed,

snow on a port city,

the moon manages to move from the street corner closer to the church,

and the cleaning ladies start their morning rounds

to find condoms in showers

and towels smeared with blood.

One day a man takes a room

in one of these hotels, he shows his student ID

to register and locks himself in his room.

In the morning they bring him breakfast and he

takes the tray, then, without taking off his clothes or shoes,

gets into the tub and turns on the water.

The cleaning ladies gossip about this endlessly

since they found him the next day

and called the police.

Did he have to swallow so many pills

to simply drown in the water?

See, death can smell of

Turkish coffee,

and what should we do after this.

Cities torn apart by the cravings of lonely women,

the moon covered with the saliva of young immigrants—

everything they talk about, all the stories they have to tell,

every gulp and every puff,

is only an excuse to continue the endless conversation.

Few guess at the limits of the visible world,

especially in this room with its toaster and night-light,

from which there is no return and no explanation,

you will not listen to the frightened cleaning lady

who first entered the room

and saw the wet currency and black dolphins

float in the water

as spiders and angels descended

from the ceiling on thin webs

to throw rose petals

into the chlorinated water.

Translated by Virlana Tkacz and Wanda Phipps