Listening to a Deep Song under the Oaktree

Hiob (with an Other Eye)

You see man in pain
You hear the complaint
Always the complaint
You forget the Song of Basic Trust
You have burried it
in the trembling Earth
But Your Heart bears it
Singing through All Time
This is how You see Hiob
Look around You

This Poem is written by Rachel R. Mann. I just followed an interview with her on BR Alpha. As a child she survived the Holocaust. She studied philosophy, medicine, psychology and paedagogy. She had a private practice in psychosomatic psychotherapy for fourty years and has published three poetry books.

As she read this poem with a clear and warm voice, its meaning shot right through my heart with lightening force and I wept loudly. I did some research, transcribed and translated the original German so that I could share this Great Word of Rahel Mann with you. I'm not sure if the last sentence ("Look around You") is translated well.

The German original says: "Schau Dich Um". Schauen has a deeper meaning than seeing or looking. Umschauen implies more than only looking around. "Um" hints towards change, transformation, turning around or Metanoia. Spiritually and existentially turning inward in order to switch away from repeating the attitude of complaining towards opening up to listen to the Heart Song of Basic Trust. That goes far deeper and is much more difficult than simply "look around you". But of course the fundamental switching away from endless repeating the complaint about the sad losses of the past may find its beginning in attentive opening up for the unknown world seen through a childs eye. So, let me dedicate this translation and postscriptum to Rahel Mann with Infinite Gratitude.