No Miracle
Today, in the bed of my mental institution, I often miss the power I had back then to penetrate the wintry night, thaw frost flowers, lay open shop windows, and guide the hand of thieves.
How I would like, for example, to deglaze the glazed peephole in the upper third of my door so Bruno, my keeper, could observe me more directly.
How my voice's impotence pained me the year before I was sent to the institution. If, on some street at night, I released a scream longing for success and yet achieved none, I, who abhor all violence, was quite capable of picking up a stone from some wretched suburban lane in Düsseldorf and taking aim at a kitchen window. I would have been so glad to put on a show, especially for Vittlar, the window dresser. If after midnight, his upper body screened by a curtain, I recognized his green and red wool socks in the window of some men's store on Königsallee or at a perfume shop near the old Concert Hall, I would gladly have sung-shattered glass for him, since he is in fact my disciple, or might be, for I still don't know if I should call him Judas or John.
Vittlar is of noble birth, and his given name is Gottfried. After my futile and embarrassing attempt at song had failed, I drummed lightly on the undamaged shop window to get the window dresser's attention, and when he came out onto the street for a quarter of an hour to chat with me, making light of his own decorative abilities, I simply called him Gottfried, because my voice had not produced the miracle that would have entitled me to call him John or Judas.
The song at the jewelry shop that transformed Jan Bronski into a thief and my mama into the owner of a ruby necklace put a temporary end to singing at shop windows with desirable displays. Mama turned pious. What made her pious? Her affair with Jan Bronski, the stolen necklace, the sweet strain of an adulterous woman's life, produced both piety and a lust for sacraments. The routine of sin establishes itself so easily: on Thursdays they met in the city, left little Oskar with Markus, engaged in a strenuous and generally satisfactory workout on Tischlergasse, refreshed themselves afterward in the Café Weitzke with Mocha and pastries, she picked up the boy at the Jew's place, accepted a few of his compliments along with a package of sewing silk he practically gave her for free, caught the Number Five streetcar, enjoyed the ride past Oliva Gate along Hindenburgallee, smiling, her thoughts far away, scarcely noticed the Maiwiese by the Sporthalle where Matzerath spent his Sunday mornings, tolerated the curve around the Sporthalle—how ugly that box could be when one had just experienced something beautiful—a further curve to the left and there behind the dust-covered trees was the Conradinum with its red-capped schoolboys—how nice little Oskar would have looked in a red cap like that with its golden C; twelve and a half he would be, sitting in the third form, ready for Latin, behaving like a true little Conradinian: hardworking, slightly cheeky, and arrogant.
Beyond the railway underpass, heading toward Reichskolonie and the Helene Lange School, Frau Agnes Matzerath's thoughts of the Conradinum and her son Oskar's missed opportunities faded away. Another curve leftward past the Church of Christ with its onion dome to alight at Max-Halbe-Platz in front of Kaisers-Kaffee, where she glanced briefly in the competition's shop windows, then toiled along Labesweg as if passing through the stations of the cross: the incipient disgust, the abnormal child holding her hand, her guilty conscience, the desire for more of the same; satiated yet still wanting more, with a mixture of loathing and good-natured affection for Matzerath, Mama toiled down Labesweg with me, with my new drum, with her package of practically free sewing silk, to the shop, to rolled oats, to kerosene and casks of herring, to currants, raisins, almonds, and gingerbread spices, to Dr. Oetker's Baking Powder, to Persil Tried and True, to Urbin's the One, to Maggi and Knorr, to Kathreiner and Kaffee Hag, to Vitello and Palmin, to Kühne's Vinegar and four-fruit jam, to those two fly strips abuzz at different pitches that dangled honey-sweet above our counter and had to be changed every other day in summer, while Mama, with a similarly oversweet soul that attracted sins buzzing high and low throughout the year, summer and winter alike, entered the Church of the Sacred Heart each Saturday and confessed to the Right Reverend Father Wiehnke.
Just as Mama took me along to the city on Thursdays to share in her guilt, so to speak, she took me on Saturdays through the portals onto the cool Catholic flagstones, having first stuffed my drum under my sweater or my little overcoat, for I couldn't do without my drum, and without my drum at my stomach I would never have crossed myself in Catholic fashion, touching my forehead, chest and shoulders, or knelt down as though to put on my shoes, or behaved and sat still on the polished church wood as the holy water slowly dried on the bridge of my nose.
I still remembered the Church of the Sacred Heart from my baptism: my heathen name caused problems, but the family insisted on Oskar, as Jan, my godfather, made clear at the church door. Then Father Wiehnke blew in my face three times to drive Satan out, the sign of the cross was made, a hand was laid upon me, salt was sprinkled and a few further measures taken against Satan. Inside the church a second stop at the actual baptismal chapel. I kept quiet as the Apostles' Creed and Our Father were tendered to me. After which Father Wiehnke found it advisable to pronounce another Satan Depart, and imagined he was awakening my senses as he touched Oskar's nose and ears, though I had known what was what right from the start. Then he wanted to hear it once more, loud and clear, asking, "Dost thou renounce Satan? And all his works? And all his pomp?"
Before I could shake my head—for I had no intention of rejecting anything—Jan answered in my stead, saying three times, "I do renounce."
Without my having said anything to spoil my relations with Satan, Father Wiehnke anointed me on the breast and between my shoulder blades. Another Apostles' Creed before the baptismal font, then finally water three times, anointing of the scalp with chrism, a white garment to stain, the candle for days of darkness, the dismissal—Matzerath paid—and as Jan carried me outside the doors of the Church of the Sacred Heart to where the taxi stood waiting in clear to partly cloudy weather, I asked Satan within me, "Did you make it through?"
Satan hopped up and down and whispered, "Did you see those church windows, Oskar? All glass, all glass!"
The Church of the Sacred Heart was built during the early years of the German empire, and its style could thus be identified as Neo-Gothic. Since it had been faced with rapidly darkening brick, and the copper dome of the tower had quickly taken on the traditional verdigris, the distinctions between early Gothic brick churches and Neo-Gothic ones were evident and disturbing only to experts. Confession was heard identically in churches old and new. Hundreds of other Right Reverend Fathers sat in the confessional on Saturday after the offices and shops had closed exactly as the Right Reverend Father Wiehnke did, holding a hairy priestly ear against the polished black grille while the congregation attempted to slip their strings of sins with bead after bead of sinfully tawdry jewels through the lattice and into his priestly ear.
While Mama, following the model Mirror of Confession, was communicating her omissions and commissions, her conduct in thought, word, and deed, to the highest authorities of the only true Church by way of Father Wiehnke's auditory canal, I, who had nothing to confess, slid down from the church wood too smoothly polished for my liking and took my stand upon the flagstones.
I admit that the flagstones in Catholic churches, the odor of a Catholic church, Catholicism as a whole, still inexplicably fascinates me, like a red-haired girl, even though I'd like to re-dye that red hair and even though Catholicism moves me to blasphemies that repeatedly betray my futile, yet still irrevocable, baptism as a Catholic. Even during the most mundane of activities, like brushing my teeth, even during bowel movements, I catch myself running through commentaries on the Mass such as: In the Holy Mass Christ's blood sacrifice is renewed, his blood is shed again for the remission of your sins, this is the chalice of his blood, the wine is transformed whenever Christ's blood is shed, the true blood of Christ is present, through the vision of his most sacred blood, the soul is sprinkled with the blood of Christ, the precious blood, washed in the blood, in the consecration the blood flows, the bloodstained flesh, the voice of Christ's blood rings through all the heavens, the blood of Christ diffuses fragrance before the face of God.
You must admit I have retained a certain Catholic tone. In earlier days I couldn't wait for a streetcar without thinking of the Virgin Mary. I called her blessed, full of grace, virgin of virgins, mother of divine grace, Thou blessed among women, Thou who art worthy of all veneration, Thou who hast borne the..., mother most amiable, mother inviolate, virgin most renowned, let me savor the sweetness of the name of Jesus as Thou savoredst it in thy heart, for it is just and meet, right and for our salvation, Queen of Heaven, thrice-blessed....
From time to time, and particularly when Mama and I went to the Church of the Sacred Heart on Saturday, that little word "blessed" so sweetened and poisoned me that I thanked Satan inside me for having survived the baptism and for providing me with an antidote that permitted me to stride across the flagstones of the Church of the Sacred Heart as a blasphemer, but still unbowed.
Jesus, after whose heart the church was named, was present not only in the sacraments, but also appeared in several small, bright paintings of the stations of the cross, and three times in painted sculpture in various poses.
One was in painted plaster. Longhaired he stood in sandals and a Prussian-blue garment on a golden pedestal. Opening his robe at his chest, he displayed, in the center of his thorax, completely contrary to nature, a tomato-red, glorified, and stylized bleeding heart so the church could name itself for this organ.
During my very first inspection of this openhearted Jesus I couldn't help but notice how embarrassingly perfect the resemblance was between the Savior and my godfather, uncle, and presumptive father Jan Bronski. Those blue, naively self-confident fanatic's eyes. That blossoming bud of a mouth, constantly ready to cry. That manly suffering, traced by the line of the eyebrows. Full, ruddy cheeks, longing to be chastised. They both had that slap-me face women are drawn to caress, along with effeminately weary hands, well manicured and adverse to labor, displaying their stigmata like the finest works of a court jeweler. I was tormented by those Bronski eyes painted in Jesus' face, regarding me with fatherly misunderstanding. After all, I had that same blue look, one that could inspire but not convince.
Oskar turned from the Sacred Heart in the right nave and hastened past the first station of the cross, where Jesus takes up the cross, to the seventh station, where he falls for the second time beneath its weight, to the high altar, above which hung the second sculpted Jesus. This one, however, whether from fatigue or in an attempt to concentrate more deeply, kept his eyes closed. What muscles the man had! This man with his decathlete body instantly made me forget the Sacred Hearted Bron-ski, drew me to the high altar, each time Mama confessed to Father Wiehnke, to gaze devoutly at the gymnast. I prayed, believe me. Sweet model gymnast, I called him, athlete of athletes, champion in cross-hanging from one-inch publican's nails. And never a twitch out of him. The perpetual flame twitched, but he maintained perfect discipline and received the highest possible score for the event. The stopwatches ticked away. They timed him. Back in the sacristy somewhat grimy acolyte fingers were already polishing the gold medal that was his due. But Jesus didn't compete in this sport for the honors he gained. Faith came to me. I knelt down, as best my knee would allow, beat out the sign of the cross on my drum, and tried to connect words like blessed or afflicted with Jesse Owens and Rudolf Harbig, with last year's Olympics in Berlin—which wasn't always successful, since I had to admit that Jesus had not played fair with the two thieves. So I disqualified him and turned my head to the left, where, arousing new hope, I saw the third sculpture of the heavenly gymnast in the Church of the Sacred Heart.
"Let me not pray till I've seen you thrice," I stammered, then set my soles once more on the flagstones, used the chessboard pattern to reach the left nave, and sensed at every step: He's watching you walk away, the saints are watching you, Peter, who was nailed to a cross head-down, Andrew, who was nailed to a slanting cross—thus St. Andrew's cross. And there's the Greek cross, the Latin or Passion cross. Crosslet crosses, Teutonic crosses, Calvary crosses appearing in textiles, pictures, and books. I saw Greek crosses, anchor crosses, budded crosses crossing each other in relief. The fleurie cross handsome, the Maltese cross prized, the hooked cross, or swastika, forbidden, de Gaulle's cross the cross of Lorraine, St. Anthony's cross for crossing the T in battles at sea. The ankh on a chain, the thief's cross too plain, the Pope's cross too papal, that Russian cross known as Lazarus too. Then there's the Red Cross. The Blue Cross that crosses itself blue in the face. Yellow cross poisons me, crossfire kills me, crusades cross to convert me, cross spiders bite me, I cross you at crosswalks, we crisscross, we cross-talk, and crosswords cry solve me. Weighed down with more crosses than I could bear, I turned and left him behind, turned my back on that gymnast nailed to the cross, who, it crossed my mind, might be cross enough to kick me in the back, for I was approaching the Virgin Mary, who held the child Jesus on her left thigh.
Oskar stood before the left side-altar of the left nave. Mary wore the expression his mama must have had as a seventeen-year-old shop girl back on Troyl when she had too little money for the movies and made up for it by gazing longingly at film posters of Asta Nielsen.
She was paying no attention to Jesus but was gazing instead at the other boy by her right knee, whom, to avoid any possible misunderstanding, I'll identify at once as John the Baptist. Both boys were my size. If pressed, I would have said Jesus was an inch taller, though according to the texts he was younger than the boy Baptist. The sculptor had amused himself by portraying the three-year-old Savior naked and pink. Because he later spent time in the wilderness, John was wearing a chocolate-colored shaggy pelt that hid half his chest, his tummy, and his little watering can.
Oskar would have done better to linger by the high altar or beside the confessional rather than near those two quite precocious boys whose grave mien bore such a shocking resemblance to his own. Naturally they had blue eyes and his chestnut hair. The only thing the sculpting barber had failed to do was give the two of them Oskar's crew cut and trim off those silly corkscrew curls.
I don't want to dwell too long on the boy Baptist, who was pointing with his left forefinger at the boy Jesus as if he were about to count off, "Eeny, meeny, miny, moe..." Without entering into counting games, I name Jesus at once and realize: we're identical twins! He could have been my twin brother. He had my stature, and my little watering can, still used only for watering back then. He stared into the world with my Bronski eyes cobalt blue, and assumed—and this I resented most—my own special pose.
My double raised both his arms, closed his hands into fists you wouldn't hesitate to thrust something into—my drumsticks, for example—and had the sculptor done so, and plastered my red and white drum on his pink little thighs as well, it would have been I, the most perfect of Oskars, sitting up there on the Virgin's knee, drumming up a congregation. There are things in this world which—no matter how sacred—just can't be left as they are.
Three steps pulled a carpet up to the Virgin robed in silvery green, to the chocolate-colored shaggy pelt of John, to the boy Jesus the color of boiled ham. Before them stood a small altar to the Virgin Mary with anemic candles and flowers in all price ranges. The green Virgin, the brown John, and the pink Jesus had halos the size of dinner plates stuck to the back of their heads. Gold leaf enriched the plates.
Had there not been steps in front of the altar I would never have climbed them. Steps, door latches, and shop windows enticed Oskar back then, nor does he remain indifferent to them even today, when his hospital bed should be all that he needs. He let himself be enticed from one step to the next, though always remaining on the same carpet. The group surrounding the little altar to the Virgin Mary was quite near to Oskar, allowing his knuckle a disdainful yet respectful percussion of all three. He scraped paint off the plaster with his fingernails. The drapery of the Virgin made its way by diverse paths down to her toes on the cloud bank. The Virgin's barely intimated shinbone gave the impression that the sculptor had first applied the flesh, then submerged it in drapery. As Oskar carefully examined the boy Jesus' little watering can, which should have been circumcised but wasn't, stroking and cautiously squeezing it, as if trying to make it move, he felt something at once pleasant and confusing in his own little watering can, at which point he left Jesus' alone in hopes that his would leave him alone.
Circumcised or not, I let things rest there, pulled the drum from under my sweater, removed it from my neck, and hung it, without damaging his halo, around Jesus. That was somewhat difficult for me given my size. I had to climb up on the sculpture so that, from the cloud bank that served as a pedestal, I could provide Jesus with an instrument.
Oskar didn't do this in January of thirty-seven, on his first visit to church after being baptized, but during Holy Week that same year. All that winter his mama had been hard-pressed to stay on top of her affair with Jan Bronski in the confessional. So Oskar found ample time on Saturdays to work out his plan, reject it, justify it, plan it anew, examine it from every angle, and then at last, casting aside all prior plans, simply, directly, and aided by the prayers at the foot of the altar on Passion Monday, carry it out.
Since Mama needed to confess before the high point of the Easter doings, she took me with her on the evening of Passion Monday, leading me by the hand along Labesweg, past Neuer Markt corner, down Elsenstraße, Marienstraße, past Wohlgemut's butcher shop, turning left at Kleinhammerpark, through the railway underpass, which was oozing nasty yellow stuff as always, to and into the Church of the Sacred Heart across from the railway embankment.
It was late when we arrived. Only two old women and an embarrassed young man still waited outside the confessional. While Mama was searching her conscience — she was leafing through the Mirror of Confession, licking her thumb as if going through a business ledger or concocting a tax return — I slipped down from the oak pew and, without passing beneath the eyes of the Sacred Heart or the gymnast on the cross, sought out the left side-altar.
Though it had to be done quickly, I did not omit the Introitus. Three steps: Introibo ad altare Dei. To God, who giveth joy to my youth. The drum removed from my neck, drawing out the Kyrie, up to the cloud bank, no lingering now by the watering can, no, just before Gloria, the drum around Jesus' neck, watch out for the halo, down from the cloud bank, remission, pardon, forgiveness, but first the sticks in those hands just made for them, one, two, three steps, I lift my eyes unto the hills, a little more carpet, the flagstones at last and a prayer stool for Oskar, who knelt down on the cushion and folded his drummer-boy hands at his face — Gloria in excelsis Deo — looked up past his folded hands toward Jesus and his drum and awaited the miracle: will he drum now, or can't he drum, or isn't he allowed to drum, either he drums or he's no real Jesus; if he doesn't drum now, Oskar's more Jesus than Jesus is.
If you want a miracle, you have to be patient. So I waited, patiently at first, perhaps not patiently enough, for the longer I kept repeating the text "All eyes attend thee, O Lord," replacing eyes with ears to match the situation, the more disappointed Oskar found himself on his prayer stool. He gave the Lord every chance, closed his eyes so the Lord might decide, since no one was looking, to make a start, even if somewhat awkwardly, but at last, after the third Credo, after Father, maker, visible and invisible, and the only begotten Son, of the Father, very of very, begotten, not made, being of one with the, by whom, for us and for our, came down, was incarnate, was made, was also, for, under, was buried, rose again, according to, ascended into, sitteth on the, shall come, to judge, and the dead, no end, I believe in, with the, together, spake by, believe in one holy catholic and...
No, all that remained for me of Catholicism was its smell. One could no longer speak of faith. Nor did I care about the smell, I was looking for something else: I wanted to hear my drum, wanted Jesus to oblige me with a little something, a small, quiet miracle. It wouldn't have to be anything resounding, with Vicar Rasczeia rushing in, Father Wiehnke laboriously lugging his flabby flesh to the miracle, with protocols to the Bishop's seat in Oliva and bishopric reports headed for Rome. No, I wasn't in the least ambitious, Oskar had no desire to be canonized. He just wanted a small private miracle, something he could see and hear, something to clarify once and for all if Oskar should drum for or against, something to proclaim which of the two blue-eyed, identical twins would henceforth have the right to call himself Jesus.
I sat and waited. Meanwhile I began to worry: Mama should be in the confessional by now and might have already finished the sixth commandment. The old man who is always tottering through churches tottered past the high altar and finally reached the left side-altar, greeted the Virgin and the boys, may have seen the drum but failed to register it. He shuffled on, growing older.
Time passed, I say, but Jesus did not beat the drum. I heard voices from the choir. I hope no one starts playing the organ, I thought anxiously. They'll start up rehearsing for Easter and create a clamor that drowns out the first paper-thin drumroll of the boy Jesus.
They didn't play the organ. Jesus didn't drum. There was no miracle, and I rose from the cushion, my knees cracking, and led myself by the nose, bored and morose, across the carpet, pulled myself up step by step, skipping all known prayers at the foot of the altar, mounted the plaster clouds, knocking over flowers in the mid-price range, and was about to remove my drum from that dumb naked child.
I admit it openly and always will: it was a mistake to try to teach him. Why did I have to take the sticks from him, leaving him the drum, then drum something for him, drumming softly at first, but then like an impatient teacher, show this false Jesus how to drum, then thrust the sticks back into his hands so he could show what he'd learned from Oskar?
Before I could take the sticks and drum away from this most stubborn of pupils, with no thought for his halo, Father Wiehnke was behind me—my drumming had tested the height and breadth of the church—Vicar Rasczeia was behind me, Mama behind me, the old man behind me, and the Vicar grabbed me, and the Right Reverend smacked me and Mama wept at me, and the Right Reverend whispered to me, and the Vicar fell to his knees and leapt up and snatched the sticks from Jesus, knelt again and jumped up for the drum, took the drum from him, snapped the halo, bumped his watering can, chipped off a bit of cloud, and fell back onto the steps, one knee, the other knee, refused me the drum, made me even angrier, made me kick the Right Reverend and put Mama to shame, and she was indeed ashamed when I kicked and bit and scratched and tore myself free from the Right Reverend, Vicar, old man, and Mama, stood at the high altar, felt Satan hopping up and down in me, and heard him as I had at my baptism: "Oskar," Satan whispered, "look around, windows everywhere, all glass, all glass."
And past the gymnast on the cross, who didn't twitch, who kept his silence, I sang at the three high windows of the apse depicting the twelve apostles in red, yellow, and green on blue. But it was not at Mark or Matthew that I aimed. I aimed at the dove standing on its head above them celebrating Pentecost, aimed at the Holy Spirit, began to vibrate, pitted my diamond against the bird and—was it my fault? Was it the gymnast, who, by not twitching, intervened? Was this the miracle, and no one knew it? They saw me trembling, soundlessly pouring forth toward the apse what everyone but Mama took for prayers, though it was broken glass I sought; but Oskar failed, his time had not yet come. I fell to the flagstones and wept bitterly, because Jesus had failed, because Oskar had failed, because the Right Reverend and Rasczeia misunderstood me and even babbled of my repenting. But Mama did not fail. She understood my tears, though she was surely glad there'd been no broken glass.
Then Mama took me in her arms, recovered the drum and sticks from the Vicar, promised the Right Reverend to pay for the damage, and received belated absolution from him, since I had interrupted her confession; Oskar received his share of the blessing too, but it meant nothing to me.
As Mama carried me from the Church of the Sacred Heart, I ticked off on my fingers: Today is Monday, tomorrow Tuesday, then Wednesday, Holy Thursday, Good Friday, then it's all over for that character who can't even drum, who won't even treat me to a little broken glass, who looks like me yet is false, who must descend to the grave while I keep on drumming and drumming but will never again ask for a miracle.