For Ludwig W.

For Ludwig W.

“Found” is not the word, but rather “encountered.”
You picture only what you seek,
For you have fixed yourself upon the notion;
But what you meet surpasses expectation.

The mess and misery cannot be shuffled off.
Life is a branching labyrinth
That reaches dead ends
Before it even starts—
With war forever poised to burst.

The world I encountered has been abolished again.
War has loosed marauding devils in droves,
Refuted every peaceful principle,
Violated time and again the right to a worthy life.

Have we barked up the wrong tree?
Or is there something we have yet to find?

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