not a she-animal
Because only a he-rat
Can get out and move on
And every she-rat
Is prey for the Stefan
Up There – Down There
Up there
Farmers
Further up
Birds
Furthest up
Parents
Down here
Jews
Further down
Children
Furthest down
Children
Of Jews
Mother – Father
Mother said be a good girl
And Father said nothing
Father Rat kept quiet
And Mother Rat said nothing
Too bad I wasn’t born to them
Far – Near
Jesus is distant
The Stefan is close
And Mother
I have to forget the most
The Other Way Around
What is better
A pit with a living child
Or a grave with a dead child?
Or maybe the other way around –
A pit with a dead child
Or a grave with a living child?
Easy
It’s easy
To get rid of a child who is small.
With a rat
It’s not so easy at all.
Body Parts
Mother
Has no eyes
Has no arms
Has no legs
Has no lips
Mother
Just has a back
The Stefan Has
no eyes Has no
arms Has no
legs Has no lips
The Stefan just has a tail
A Hug
The lice are free
To roam the place
From my hair
To my forehead
And all over my face
I lie there
And I feel them tug
On my face
On my body
For me that’s a hug
Mouth
I give you the name
First just Rat
Then My Pet
Then I give you one with panache
Like Stanislaw or Stash
Tell me yours, Little Girl
You implore.
The Stefan’s mouth
Calls me the Whore
Skin
A hole-child
Is running out of skin
Tail
I have a friend with a tail
And he has four legs
The Stefan also has a tail
It’s between his two legs
Head
When The Stefan climbs down
This is what I do:
I bang my head and hope
There’s a child on the other side
With a rat-pet too
Porridge
Mother pig
Cooked some porridge
And this little piggy had none
Food
Dear Rat,
Make sure you eat it all
To keep from being small
Might makes right
And a giant bite
You’ll swallow every crumb
For me you’ll have your fill
Eat straight out of my hand
And show me you can kill
Hide And Seek
Hide and seek
Just count to ten
No one will find me
Ever again
Catch
If I run away
He gets even more wild
That’s the game that we play
The Stefan, the child
Pretending
Let’s pretend
I’ll be the rat
And the little girl’s you
Cause I want to be
The scary one too
Isn't It Lucky
Isn’t it lucky the rat can bite for me
Isn’t it lucky he can scratch for me
He can pass on diseases
He can crawl around too
And do all the things that I can’t do
Colors
Green is what comes out of your mouth
Red is what comes out of your legs
Brown is what comes out from behind
Black is light
Cold – Warm
I’ll never be cold
For dirt is my blanket
I’ll always be warm
For I’m covered with blood
Dolly
I once had a dolly with braids
Who knew how to close her eyes
They cut off her braids
They gouged out her eyes
And now she’s a dolly that’s bald and blind
Looking for a girl of a different kind
Lullaby
Once upon a time
There was a little Jewish girl
And she had
Little Jewish hands
And little Jewish eyes
And a little Jewish mouth
And a little Jewish body
And a big hole
A Riddle
Where’s the little girl?
What little girl?
Was there ever a little girl?
Saint
When Stefan the Saint
Was as small as an elf
He was snatched from his bed
By Mister Satan himself
A horrible monster
Was what his parents found
Their sweet and cuddly baby
Disappeared in the ground
I want the first Stefan
To come and hunt down
Mister Satan who owns
The bed-pit in the ground
Cause if rats were creatures
That Saint Stefan adored
He’d have Heaven summon
A hundred saints or more
Silence
When the Stefan thrashes
Bashes
Slashes
The animal sounds
Come out of the ground
And I
Vomit in silence
A Ladder
Up
And down
And up
And down
See-saw
See-saw
Time
The Stefan comes down
The Stefan goes up
Yesterday is what came before
Tomorrow is what comes next
Down comes the Stefan
Up goes the Stefan
That’s how time marches on
Sun
Maybe the sun doesn’t go up
And the night doesn’t go down
Maybe beyond the pit
The world doesn’t go round
And darkness isn’t black
And the sun doesn’t set
And I’m the only one left
But I don’t know it yet
A Tree
At the tip of the root–
The one close to the sky–
There’s a bird made of sand
Up and up it will fly
And tell them everything
Rain
If anything grows there
It’s all thanks to me
Cause my body
Makes
Rain
Water
When you flow over me
Tell someone
That the little girl...
A Name
A little girl without a name
A place without a name
People without a name
Clean
Clean is when a rat licks me
Clean is when no lice hug me
Clean is when nothing comes out of me
And the cleanest I’ll be
Is when I cease to be
A Promise
I’ll pee
I’ll shit
I’ll die
I’ll give off a stench
That’s all I can promise
Afraid
I don’t know any more
If I’m afraid
Because if I stop being afraid
I’ll no longer be
Happy
The happiest day that lies ahead
Is the one when I find out
The Stefan’s dead
Steps
Three steps
Forward
Three steps
To the left
Three steps
Back
Three steps
To the right
That’s how you cross yourself
That’s how you’re blessed
Maybe if I do it
The pain will be less
1 Even if we don’t quite know