THE ROSE VENDOR (Satis Shroff)
He comes with his apologetic Asian face,
A swarthy man selling roses,
In cafes, taverns, pubs and eating-places,
In the evenings
When the shops have closed in Germany.
He comes when you're discussing politics
He comes when you're wooing your date
He comes with his roses
In Chinese, Greek and Italian restaurants
Between bites of Peking duck, gyros and lasagne.
He thrusts his bunch of red, mauve roses
Looks at your eyes and hers.
You look away
Or you say, "Nein Danke".
Scared to look into his brown eyes
Eyes that almost plead to you
To buy his roses.
Wet eyes that remind you
Of Fifi, your poodle.
The rose vendor doesn't utter a word
Does he have a tongue?
Or is our tongue too difficult?
Can't he speak pidgin, this asylant?
What brings him to our land?
He isn't allowed to work
He's probably not anerkannt.
He's intimidated, not integrated.
He can only sell roses
In cafes, taverns and pubs.
"It's good so, otherwise
He'll take my job," says a blond German.
It doesn't bother him to do odd jobs
Washing dishes, folding napkins
Pouring out drinks and fruit cocktails.
He doesn't mind being a portier in a hotel,
Carrying other people's bags,
And pleased to get a tip.
It doesn't bother him
To work in the wards:
Psychiatric, neurological or surgical
Helping disabled German patients
Carrying their urine-bottles, pans and pills.
It doesn't bother him one bit
To work in factories that produce:
Chocolates, furniture and microchips.
To inhale poisonous gases and work
With lethal, carcinogenic chemicals.
To do what they ask
For it's again the epoch,
Of inflation and recession,
Of broken contracts, lost jobs,
Split and patchwork families.
Of people suddenly grown envious,
Wary, jealous and fierce.
The basic instinct in the Germans
Breaks through.
The rich, good German shows an ugly face.
Who's to blame for this economic mess?
The sly politicians?
Or the dumb, lobbyless aliens?
The asylum-seekers from the Third World
Or the Aussiedler and others
From behind the Iron Curtain?
The Aussiedler are ethnic Germans
The aliens are not.
Shall we throw bricks into Turkish shops?
And smear swastikas on Jewish graves?
Shall we burn books and works of art again?
And put on brown shirts?
A start has already made.
In Rostock, Hoyerswerda and Mölln.
Some even deny the Holocaust as a lie.
The drums are beating now and then.
The old Reichsflags are seen
In the streets and stadions
And no longer in the attic.
Bomber jackets, baseball bats
Springerstiefel and skinheads
Belong to the Zeitgeist.
A new brown subculture is growing,
Thanks to the electronic media,
Warns the federal Verfassungsschutz.
Conservative, pure, aryan to the core
Skinheaded, blue-eyed,
Arrogant and nationalistic
Is that the neo-German of this new century?
Quo vadis European Union?
The ecu, the multiethnicity?
A united Europe, one big world?
Where's the integration that was spoken of?
Where's the tolerance?
Where is the Miteinander?
Gone down the gutter?
