The 'homework' for the next meeting was to write a piece about finding something in a person's pocket.
No sniggering at the back.
I've been mulling over what I should write since. The obvious thing would be to write a poem. But, I have been working on various prose pieces, and thought it might be a useful incentive to write a fiction piece.
Like many creative things the story came about by a circuitous route. Regular readers will know I am currently reading Hitler's Children: The Story of the Baader-Meinhof Terrorist Gang
by Jillian Becker. In fact I have been reading a number of things about Germany in WWII. And, I find my preconceptions being rather challenged. For instance, one of the books I have been reading was about the Hitlerjugend in Normandy. All, or most, of whom were in the Hitler Youth, which conjures up images of swinging Indian Clubs and marching about. However according to this first hand account, far from the Hitler Youth being like the Scouts, it was more akin tot he Woodland Folk. And indeed Becker makes the same comparison.Here is the poem that came out of my reflections on this....
Sabina finds me reading Rilke,
in the lower meadow by the stream.
Again and again I have come here
to paint the little Luthern chapel
but I cannot catch the light.
She brings her mother's regards
and a small cake, which she cuts
with my pocket knife. Stabbing
the crumbs with our finger tips
we read Autumn Day, on the rug,
our bodies almost touching.
The paper curls in the breeze
pinned by the smudged and bloodied
watercolours, in their wooden box.
The water jar sits safe in my shoe.
Angels in the churchyard
turn their backs, as naked
we splash and prance in the stream.
The sunlight runs like spring rain
upon our bodies. But we are not children.
No one is young. For high above,
silver geese fly in formation,
heading south; their reflection
obscured by the brilliance
of our glistening laughter.
So anyway, here is the 300 word story...
“Ah the poet,” exclaimed Inspector Meyer, “we meet again and
again.”
“And again and again you make the same joke,” replied Vesper
dryly. He checked the oak lined corridor before closing the door. “It’s about
the Schaub case. There’s something you need to know.”
Meyer pushed the rape file, he was working on, to one side.
He indicated Vesper to sit. The young sergeant did so, peering at his superior
through the thick lenses of his glasses. “Schaub?” began Meyer, recapping the
case from memory, “Schaub, male, 42,
found floating the river last week. The doctor says he was in the water for
approximately ten days. The neighbours report he had been drinking heavily
following the death of his son at… uh?... did we ever establish were the son
was killed?”
“No sir.”
“The wife and daughter killed by a stray bomb. He was heard
expressing defeatist opinions on the night he died. A witness reports that he
may have been fighting with two men on
the Fliesch bridge. The case remains open, but we are not actively
investigating. Have I missed anything?”
“This,” said Vesper, pushing a crumpled identity card across
the desk.
Meyer took it, opened it, and pouted at the insignificance.
“It’s Herr Schaub’s identity card, what of it?”
“It’s the stamp sir.” Meyer looked more closely. “The stamp
was only issued two days ago, which makes me wonder how it could be found in
Herr Schaub’s jacket pocket.”
Meyer laid the identity card on the desk before him, gently
running his figures across the smudged and blistered cardboard. “Herr Schaub
was a farmer? Was he not? And a farmer must be able to predict the weather if
he is to make money.”
“I don’t think it was suicide sir. In fact I know it wasn’t.
There’s something else.”
Which has got me thinking of ways in which this might be expanded.
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