Kristallnaach [English translation]

Every now and then I think there's a clangour

Something's gone astray inside of me

A noise, a very faint one

Sometimes it has this familiar clang

I can't usually identify right away

You wake up, rub your eyes and see

In a picture that's somewhere in between Brueghel and Bosch

People who don't care about the sirens

Because an "all-clear" is just around the corner

Smells like Kristallnacht1

In the calm before the storm - what is this?

People leaving town on the quiet

Dignitaries undercover

Are rushing past

They don't like to be seen being a part of it

When public opinion - always ready to go

With its anger reaching its boiling point, screaming

"Heil - death halloo", riled up beyond any limit

Crying for vengeance, trembling with envy

During Kristallnacht

But those who feel disturbed by anything that's "different"

Swimming with the tide, the way they're supposed to

Those to whom gays are criminals

To whom foreigners are scum

They need someone to mislead them

When that happens, no cavalry's there to save the day

No Zorro's there to care

He's just pissing a "Z" into the snow

Babbling, falling, drunk with coolness

"So what? - Kristallnacht!"

In the church with the Franz Kafka clock

Without hands, only hour marks

A blind is reading

'Shockheaded Peter' to a deaf

Behind a triply locked door

And the guard with the key chain

Considers himself some kind of genius

Because he's grinding back doors into powder

And sells it as a cure for claustrophobia

During Kristallnacht

All the while, at the market square perhaps

Unmasked, wearing their true face tonight

Collecting stones and sharpening their knives

For those who have already been ratted out

The lynch mob is practicing for Judgment Day

Only provisionally moored for loading

- The galleys under pressure already -

They're waiting for slaves down at the harbour

For the rubble from that uneven fight

During Kristallnacht

Where Darwin is an excuse for everything2

Whether it's displacement or torture of people

Where money is the root of power

Where being strong is all that counts

Disfigured by cowering and standing to attention

Where they're playing hymns on a comb even3

In their barbaric hunger for profit

From cheers to jeers4

Whenever there's something to gain

They have their daily Kristallnacht

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kristallnacht2. Refers to social Darwinism which some genocidal regimes have used as justification to "cull the weak".3. Possibly a metaphor for patriotism as a foil for ulterior motives, or exaggerated patriotism in general.4. Lit. "Yelling 'hosanna' and 'crucify him'".