image by
Herbert Bayer
The lonely metropolitan, 1932

Dear visitor: looking at my blogs stats,
this is the post most of you are stumbling into without knowing me or my work.
I guess this visit must be a disappointment for you,
for there is neither an attempt on my side to put this photograph into a historic context,
nor is there any attempt of me to explain the image.
Are you all college students with Herbert Bayer on your curriculum?
Please leave a note why you were hitting this page.
(And what college you are going to…., I am the curious kind of person.)
Thanks for your kindness, Zoltán

By the way: the other popular post in my blog is called “playboy and youtube“.

Eyes in the Big City

by Kurt Tucholsky (1890-1935)translated by david raphael israelin collaboration with(& thanks to) Indeterminacy

When toward your work you’re wending
in early morn
and in the station standing
with woes forlorn
the City smooth as asphalt
reveals before your gazes
in the funneling of humanity

en masse its million faces
two alien eyes one quick glance
the pupils lids & brow
what was it? maybe

your life’s lone chance
gone forever now!

Throughout your days you’ll amble
a thousand streetshow
many along your ramble
your face forget
an eye it is a’winking
the soul it is a’ringing
you’re reckoning its beckon
merely for a second
two alien eyes
one swift look
the pupils lids & brow
what was it? none
turns back the clock
gone forever now!

You’re obliged along your sojourn
to cities-wander
you see in a pulse-beat’s moment
the unknown other
perhaps it is a foe
maybe it’s a friend
it might amid your woe
be offering a hand
two alien eyes one swift look
the pupils lids & brow
’twas what? a page from
the great human book
gone forever now!

Poem added after Joannas comment.
The translation I found here.

Augen in der Großstadt

Du gehst dein Leben lang
auf tausend Straßen;
du siehst auf deinem Gang,
die dich vergaßen.
Ein Auge winkt,
die Seele klingt;
du hast’s gefunden,
nur für Sekunden…
Zwei fremde Augen, ein kurzer Blick,
die Braue, Pupillen, die Lider -
Was war das? Kein Mensch dreht die Zeit zurück…
vorbei, verweht, nie wieder.


Du mußt auf deinem Gang
durch Städte wandern;
siehst einen Pulsschlag lang
den fremden Andern.
Es kann ein Feind sein,
es kann ein Freund sein,
es kann im Kampfe dein
Genosse sein.
Es sieht hinüber
und zieht vorüber…
Zwei fremde Augen, ein kurzer Blick,
die Braue, Pupillen, die Lider -
Was war das? Von der großen Menschheit ein Stück!
Vorbei, verweht, nie wieder.