Ballad Of The Gas Fitter
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file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
BALLAD OF THE GAS-FITTER - G. Achterberg I You've reached the houses round the back. Behind the fronts, in chambers dim and motionless, you keep non-stop appearing out of nothingness when I pass by and look in through the blind. Although in passing by you disappear again, the window next shows nothing but the same. Behind it live a Johnson and his kin, as if you would evade me in this name. But that says nothing. Doors do much forbear; they have a letter-box, a doorstep and a bell. The apple-seller lures you with his call. And forged keys are anything but rare. I can come in - dead innocent - as well to offer you my services; gas-fitter is my call. II Then - in your house at work in shining midday-light, - disguised with all the outfit of a workman of the town I cast about my eyes and get you in my sight. But the ceiling slowly turns to a slab of stone. We're getting dim. The walls are all of earth. The room is saturated, as I see. It cannot be indeed. I turn the screws for all I'm worth. As long as I confine myself to this activity I know that for each other we stay incognito, while, bent or on my knees, I'm busy all along or, lying on my belly, examine what is wrong. And thinking all the time that it is better so. Death silence, which a hammer-blow destroys. Death silence, which heals the hammer-blows. III Shall I submerge the house? Or shall I break the conduit-pipes so that the gas can run? I see my fall, must mind the fittings, so I make file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (1 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
the mental error rapidly undone. Then later in the papers would be read: 'By some mysterious cause a fitter met - while practising his trade - with death. Asphyxia by gas. In the adjacent room was found a woman, owner of the house, to whom the same unlucky fate had come. She lay upon the floor; in her extended hand she firmly clasped a letter, which began: 'I will come back, large as the world may be'. Must have been caught while reading it. Surmise of sinful intercourse can therefore not arise. IV I've stopped the leak at last and get my things, which lie all scattered in the place. My legs do feel as heavy pipes of lead and drops of sweat are running down my face. As if I do perform a superhuman deed, I wave my hand - a gesture to declare and turn to you, but you are no more there. Late midday-light is all that I can see. I lift the tool-box from the floor and put it on my shoulder. In the hall my footsteps wake a hollow song. The door falls to. Street-noise seems more remote and low. Thick fog is blurring all. I realize: at this turn I have been wrong. V When I'm back home and leisurely begin to eat, the telephone rings loud. I pick up the receiver and dead commonly does from the other side a new command come out. It's the director. His voice is loud and strident too, but I can feel a hidden, tender undertone. 'Tomorrow you shall visit that street again, my son. You know that I do take much interest in you.'
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (2 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
No donkey hits its foot two times against a stone. It would be best for me to stay here not alone. I might as well go out and have a look tonight at the new-built block of flats there at the other side. At the entrance there are numbers, I can see. It will get clear now by itself to me. VI All that I came to know that night was that the porter was sleeping in his bed. He had forgotten the figures in his head. 'T lay canted on an arm. Gripped by that sight I looked in through the window from outside. It rustled softly. A gentle breeze passed by. And there, undutiful, and ever so close by a living man, who surely on this tight corner could have helped me out, if it had not become too dark and desolate than that I was allowed to wake him up by whispering. He'd lose his head; not only he, but also the director. That could not be. Nobody heard me go away. Did he look up? VII With sleep still in my eyes, at peep of day, I get my tools and start then on my way. The streets so early seem as free as air, although the final aim has taken post somewhere. I've never known that safe sensation in my life. Someone of the board is cycling through the street. He hardly looks aside, although I stop to greet. He must have had a quarrel with his wife. Perhaps he thinks it is suspect to find me here in borough-quarters. To his mind nothing can be gained by a fitter in this place. There lives, in other light, a young and reckless race. I have been signalised. So I turn round and I decide to bend my steps to town. VIII file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (3 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
I near the last of possibilities. Push-buttons, keenly ranked and white, set at defiance like false teeth. My fingers make a biting fight. While I delay and bite my nails, the door springs loose. A day-girl takes the ash-bin out. This new event makes me decide, for I realize: time fails me. Nervously I ask her where the gap can be. Her face points upwards with a faded spot, that may be meant to be a hit at me. Which I know well; so that I pray to God. The lift moves upwards to the end of what no fitter has been able yet to mend. IX As I climb up, grows more and more the space dividing you from me. Life feels surrounded by nickel and by steel. The building is no clinch-nail short. Here is no gas. God is the gap and pours his depths out over me to make a puffed-up fitter see how high he gets at every flat. The lift goes up past falling floors. I do not know with what or where to start. Perhaps into my mind a final word will dart if I do ask him after the first cause. I must get out: a shock goes over me. I give it over now to his decree. X All doors swing open. I'm enclosed by gentlemen of every tongue and race. They cry in chorus, while they set their face: you needn't tell us stories, as if I where a ghost. Did I therefore creep underground? There's at my feet a bag with dirty wash file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (4 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
when I'm descending in the pit of glass. Hear how they run one through another there upstairs. I'm looking round a while in the environment. It's midday in the meantime. All about is peak hour now. Schools are coming out. Children babble at their mother's hand. Cars rush past. Bike-bells tinkle in my ears, as if I had been standing there for years. XI The gas works turn upon their axis. When I saw my end in view go all awry and stole off like a dripping dog then, shy and well aware that nothing could be done, a vacuum must have slipped in, with which no trade has anything to do. The children are playing in the circle again. As in reminiscence they're turning too. I go straight to the office then. The director in own person lets me in. He's mild and gentle when he hears me. I need think up no further lies. Deep in his specs it crawls, as if he cries. Then we clasp hands, he mans himself and disappears. XII The head-committee of the Christian tradeunion orders that all fitters join without delay in an urgent meeting on this very day, and informs that one of them did violate the rules by acting with his instruments on all the places where he was. Hence it demands, now all the body is no longer sound, that he confesses that he's guilty on this ground. For the first time since the trade is plied all gas- and water-fitters of the town - this time not searching for a gap - kneel down, together in all corners, side by side. The chairman says: do sin no longer, please. file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (5 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
And then they leave, dead silent at their ease. XIII After many years we find again the fitter in the old men's home. His hair is white; a worn out childish chap, who in a guide of streets is spelling names, letter by letter. His table and his bed he has to share with plumber, postman, overseer. Time and again he gets it here, because he's always nagging at the fare. He is provided for until his end. Sick pay and a burial-fee enable him to be contented and benevolent and cause the father not to strangle him. Public works supplied a roof over his head. He is allowed to smoke a cigarette. XIV At last he closed his eyes and held his breath for good. His mouth fell open, but was bound. The undertaker measured him and found him fit to fill a coffin of six feet. And everyone gave him a last salute: Johnson, day-girl and director, they all stood at the grave, united with those of the flat; as I in black, with stick and bowler hat. Everybody further kept his mouth. Then they trod forward - out of it, without a sound to watch the fitter slowly sink into the ground, as if once more to catch him in a nap now that he had to fix his final gap. The earth does cover him. He rests in God.
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (6 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
BALLAD OF THE GAS-FITTER - G. Achterberg I You've reached the houses round the back. Behind the fronts, in chambers dim and motionless, you keep non-stop appearing out of nothingness when I pass by and look in through the blind. Although in passing by you disappear again, the window next shows nothing but the same. Behind it live a Johnson and his kin, as if you would evade me in this name. But that says nothing. Doors do much forbear; they have a letter-box, a doorstep and a bell. The apple-seller lures you with his call. And forged keys are anything but rare. I can come in - dead innocent - as well to offer you my services; gas-fitter is my call. II Then - in your house at work in shining midday-light, - disguised with all the outfit of a workman of the town I cast about my eyes and get you in my sight. But the ceiling slowly turns to a slab of stone. We're getting dim. The walls are all of earth. The room is saturated, as I see. It cannot be indeed. I turn the screws for all I'm worth. As long as I confine myself to this activity I know that for each other we stay incognito, while, bent or on my knees, I'm busy all along or, lying on my belly, examine what is wrong. And thinking all the time that it is better so. Death silence, which a hammer-blow destroys. Death silence, which heals the hammer-blows. III Shall I submerge the house? Or shall I break the conduit-pipes so that the gas can run? I see my fall, must mind the fittings, so I make file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (1 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
the mental error rapidly undone. Then later in the papers would be read: 'By some mysterious cause a fitter met - while practising his trade - with death. Asphyxia by gas. In the adjacent room was found a woman, owner of the house, to whom the same unlucky fate had come. She lay upon the floor; in her extended hand she firmly clasped a letter, which began: 'I will come back, large as the world may be'. Must have been caught while reading it. Surmise of sinful intercourse can therefore not arise. IV I've stopped the leak at last and get my things, which lie all scattered in the place. My legs do feel as heavy pipes of lead and drops of sweat are running down my face. As if I do perform a superhuman deed, I wave my hand - a gesture to declare and turn to you, but you are no more there. Late midday-light is all that I can see. I lift the tool-box from the floor and put it on my shoulder. In the hall my footsteps wake a hollow song. The door falls to. Street-noise seems more remote and low. Thick fog is blurring all. I realize: at this turn I have been wrong. V When I'm back home and leisurely begin to eat, the telephone rings loud. I pick up the receiver and dead commonly does from the other side a new command come out. It's the director. His voice is loud and strident too, but I can feel a hidden, tender undertone. 'Tomorrow you shall visit that street again, my son. You know that I do take much interest in you.'
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (2 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
No donkey hits its foot two times against a stone. It would be best for me to stay here not alone. I might as well go out and have a look tonight at the new-built block of flats there at the other side. At the entrance there are numbers, I can see. It will get clear now by itself to me. VI All that I came to know that night was that the porter was sleeping in his bed. He had forgotten the figures in his head. 'T lay canted on an arm. Gripped by that sight I looked in through the window from outside. It rustled softly. A gentle breeze passed by. And there, undutiful, and ever so close by a living man, who surely on this tight corner could have helped me out, if it had not become too dark and desolate than that I was allowed to wake him up by whispering. He'd lose his head; not only he, but also the director. That could not be. Nobody heard me go away. Did he look up? VII With sleep still in my eyes, at peep of day, I get my tools and start then on my way. The streets so early seem as free as air, although the final aim has taken post somewhere. I've never known that safe sensation in my life. Someone of the board is cycling through the street. He hardly looks aside, although I stop to greet. He must have had a quarrel with his wife. Perhaps he thinks it is suspect to find me here in borough-quarters. To his mind nothing can be gained by a fitter in this place. There lives, in other light, a young and reckless race. I have been signalised. So I turn round and I decide to bend my steps to town. VIII file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (3 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
I near the last of possibilities. Push-buttons, keenly ranked and white, set at defiance like false teeth. My fingers make a biting fight. While I delay and bite my nails, the door springs loose. A day-girl takes the ash-bin out. This new event makes me decide, for I realize: time fails me. Nervously I ask her where the gap can be. Her face points upwards with a faded spot, that may be meant to be a hit at me. Which I know well; so that I pray to God. The lift moves upwards to the end of what no fitter has been able yet to mend. IX As I climb up, grows more and more the space dividing you from me. Life feels surrounded by nickel and by steel. The building is no clinch-nail short. Here is no gas. God is the gap and pours his depths out over me to make a puffed-up fitter see how high he gets at every flat. The lift goes up past falling floors. I do not know with what or where to start. Perhaps into my mind a final word will dart if I do ask him after the first cause. I must get out: a shock goes over me. I give it over now to his decree. X All doors swing open. I'm enclosed by gentlemen of every tongue and race. They cry in chorus, while they set their face: you needn't tell us stories, as if I where a ghost. Did I therefore creep underground? There's at my feet a bag with dirty wash file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (4 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
when I'm descending in the pit of glass. Hear how they run one through another there upstairs. I'm looking round a while in the environment. It's midday in the meantime. All about is peak hour now. Schools are coming out. Children babble at their mother's hand. Cars rush past. Bike-bells tinkle in my ears, as if I had been standing there for years. XI The gas works turn upon their axis. When I saw my end in view go all awry and stole off like a dripping dog then, shy and well aware that nothing could be done, a vacuum must have slipped in, with which no trade has anything to do. The children are playing in the circle again. As in reminiscence they're turning too. I go straight to the office then. The director in own person lets me in. He's mild and gentle when he hears me. I need think up no further lies. Deep in his specs it crawls, as if he cries. Then we clasp hands, he mans himself and disappears. XII The head-committee of the Christian tradeunion orders that all fitters join without delay in an urgent meeting on this very day, and informs that one of them did violate the rules by acting with his instruments on all the places where he was. Hence it demands, now all the body is no longer sound, that he confesses that he's guilty on this ground. For the first time since the trade is plied all gas- and water-fitters of the town - this time not searching for a gap - kneel down, together in all corners, side by side. The chairman says: do sin no longer, please. file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (5 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt
And then they leave, dead silent at their ease. XIII After many years we find again the fitter in the old men's home. His hair is white; a worn out childish chap, who in a guide of streets is spelling names, letter by letter. His table and his bed he has to share with plumber, postman, overseer. Time and again he gets it here, because he's always nagging at the fare. He is provided for until his end. Sick pay and a burial-fee enable him to be contented and benevolent and cause the father not to strangle him. Public works supplied a roof over his head. He is allowed to smoke a cigarette. XIV At last he closed his eyes and held his breath for good. His mouth fell open, but was bound. The undertaker measured him and found him fit to fill a coffin of six feet. And everyone gave him a last salute: Johnson, day-girl and director, they all stood at the grave, united with those of the flat; as I in black, with stick and bowler hat. Everybody further kept his mouth. Then they trod forward - out of it, without a sound to watch the fitter slowly sink into the ground, as if once more to catch him in a nap now that he had to fix his final gap. The earth does cover him. He rests in God.
file:///G|/Achtrbrg/ballad-of-the-gas-fitter.txt (6 van 6)27-05-07 17:38:33
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