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on getting forklift certified in Königs Wusterhausen

I had expected to be the oldest one
there but we were all old
all seven of us
we were all in our 40s and 50s
sitting there in that open-window classroom
hoping for a new chance
a new lease on life
I of course struggled more than anyone
because I was the only non-German
and the course was in German
eight hours of technical talk about forklift
safety rules regulations
videos of accidents forklifts forklifts
this was our future
our future was not a glittery red carpet
ceremony in Cannes
not a bottom of the ninth
grand slam over the green monster
no we were simple laborers
the ground of being
hands feet eyes bowels we were better than robots
but only slightly
and we might soon be replaced by them
in which case the class and the €175 it cost
would be a waste
but at least they had supplied us
with chocolate chip cookies
and unlimited thermos coffee
and no one laughed at my
German.

language partner

you see him over there? he asked. the old fart
in the aloha shirt and oily hair?
yeah, that one,
that’s Karlheinz,
the guy who got clubbed on the U-Bahn
for singing
“Deutschland, Deutschland über alles‘
the Germans
call him a Herumtreiber and a fauler Sack;
the expats find him about as endearing
as the smell of wet dog.
Karlheinz, with his bedroom eyes
and his touchy-feely hands
and his droopy earlobes that jump
whenever he gets worked up about money,
hasn’t had a job since the euro
replaced the mark. he would much rather
mooch, eating raw vegetables and drinking his one
small Haake Beck a night, bitching
and bitching.
Karlheinz whines like a broken
steering pump, but he does have one
redeeming quality: he doesn’t speak English
so if you want to practice German on someone
he’s the only one here who will put up with it.

estate clothes

whatever path my dog and I take
through the forest, we always seem to pass the same old man.
he is tall and bald with just a little silver fluff ringing his ears
eyes lackluster skin greenish expression glib.
he looks like he’s already been embalmed and is always wearing
the same beige cargo vest with some kind of plaid undershirt.
the style is popular among retirees in east Berlin.
it is also popular in the thrift shop my dog and I pass
on our way home from the forest. there must be two dozen
plaid shirts in there, and the rack of beige cargo vests
stretches all the way across the back of the shop.
they are estate clothes. and when I look at them through the window,
I can almost smell the mold, the dust, the yeast spores,
the old man in the forest.

friedhof baumschulenweg (far corner cinder block tomb)

there is something to be said for lying dead
in the far corner of a cemetery
where the bushes run wild
and the grass is never mowed
and someone abandoned a beer bottle
and an old sleeping bag.

there is something
to be said for lying eternally
beneath a stone
that looks like a broken cinder
block
pitted and pocked
the epitaph
rubbed off;
there is something to be said

for lying dead in the mud
forgotten
by everyone in the world
unbothered by gossip love
hate money
war
injustice
just
lying there
comfortably
in your bones
as the rain irrigates the grass
over your head and the seasons
pass by quicker than
trains.

best writing weather

9 a.m.
on a Tuesday,
rain drizzling in muted light.
bright yellow leaves lying wet in the garden.
the apple tree that shed all its apples
clutching in its gnarled hand a waterlogged
crow. the crow makes a human sound.
Nosferatu shadows haunt the S-Bahn platform.
a worker in traffic-cone orange hollers toward
the street, his beard floating
in the winds.

just three hours ago,
the skies were luminous,
splashed with pink, lavender and gold.
now, it’s just gloomy and cold and October
out there. but inside here (where the months
seemed to have forgotten themselves)
there is a Chinese philosopher
dog warming my feet, wild saxophone
notes floating around the room,
and my fingers, buttered with electric
light, bang
on these keys.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

M.P. Powers is an American who has lived in Berlin, Germany since 2011. He is the author of the novel The Initiate (Anxiety Press ’23) and the poetry collection Strange Instruments (Outcast Press, 2026). When he is not writing, he sketches, paints and ships bottles of Japanese booze. His artwork can be found here: https://www.instagram.com/mppowers1132/?hl=en.