'Assault of Angels' by Michael Roberts
I typed out a copy of this poem on 23rd March 1993.
Two years after visiting Berlin as a guest of an old Army friend, Bob Lloyd, who was commander of the British garrison after the Wall came down, as I typed I would have been thinking of particular angels and my pilgrimage to visit as many scenes as possible from Wim Wender's wonderful film 'Wings of Desire' released thirty years ago last May. A lot of the places in the film I visited have long been built over, including of course, the site of Hitler's bunker that was in no man's land between the two walls.
It was quite something to follow in the footsteps of Bruno Ganz and Otto Sander across the Potsdamer Platz, around the National Library and other locations.
I wonder if this Michael Roberts is related to Michael Symmons Roberts featured here? There is a similar style and an affinity for the unseen, implacable and remorseless. Just checked the younger Roberts entry on 'Wikipedia' but it doesn't mention a connection. It does however say that he went to Oxford as an atheist and then became a Roman Catholic convert.
I thought this article was of interest about the poet. I rather liked the painting that was inspired by it but I don't think I would pay the asking price.
That last line is a cracker isn't it? It does beg the question of what state the angels might leave the house, once admitted: you might end up the the street brushing off the dust with only the door frame still standing. I think of something Roberto Calasso has to say:
"What conclusions can we draw? Every good and bad fortune is a test: the sovereignty of the mind lies in recognising them, in dealing with them as such, in getting through them with the secretly indifferent curiosity of the traveller...... To invite the gods ruins our relations with them but sets history in motion. A life in which the gods are not invited in isn't worth living. It will be quieter, but there won't be any stories. And you could suppose that these dangerous invitations were in fact contrived by the gods themselves, because the gods get bored with men who have no stories." ('The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony' p 387)
ASSAULT OF ANGELS
The mind trembles from the assault of angels;
Running in familiar light it sees the sea,
It remembers the dark subway and the lost fields of childhood,
It remembers the loneliness of first love and the end of a summer;
These are familiar and small.
But the assault of angels is more terrible; angels are invisible,
Angels cast no shadow, and their unpredicted motion
Moves the familiar shadows into light.
Angels cannot burn the fingers: unacknowledged,
They pass unseen. No one will ever know.
Refuse them; they have no claim to charity,
To ignore them offers the key to omniscience.
Angels breed darkness out of light, angels rejoice
In things we hate and fear.
Angels are the launching of a new ship,
Angels offer to inhabit the landscape of your body,
Angels will let you grow as a child grows,
They are your enemy; they will destroy you.
And a time comes when a man is afraid to grow,
A time when the house is comfortable and narrow.
A time when the spirit of life contracts.
Angels are at the door: admit them now.
Stills from 'Wings of Desire' - my Desert Island Film. My family bought me the film in 1988, before the collapse of the Wall and all of it's huge significances.
Two years after visiting Berlin as a guest of an old Army friend, Bob Lloyd, who was commander of the British garrison after the Wall came down, as I typed I would have been thinking of particular angels and my pilgrimage to visit as many scenes as possible from Wim Wender's wonderful film 'Wings of Desire' released thirty years ago last May. A lot of the places in the film I visited have long been built over, including of course, the site of Hitler's bunker that was in no man's land between the two walls.
It was quite something to follow in the footsteps of Bruno Ganz and Otto Sander across the Potsdamer Platz, around the National Library and other locations.
I wonder if this Michael Roberts is related to Michael Symmons Roberts featured here? There is a similar style and an affinity for the unseen, implacable and remorseless. Just checked the younger Roberts entry on 'Wikipedia' but it doesn't mention a connection. It does however say that he went to Oxford as an atheist and then became a Roman Catholic convert.
I thought this article was of interest about the poet. I rather liked the painting that was inspired by it but I don't think I would pay the asking price.
That last line is a cracker isn't it? It does beg the question of what state the angels might leave the house, once admitted: you might end up the the street brushing off the dust with only the door frame still standing. I think of something Roberto Calasso has to say:
"What conclusions can we draw? Every good and bad fortune is a test: the sovereignty of the mind lies in recognising them, in dealing with them as such, in getting through them with the secretly indifferent curiosity of the traveller...... To invite the gods ruins our relations with them but sets history in motion. A life in which the gods are not invited in isn't worth living. It will be quieter, but there won't be any stories. And you could suppose that these dangerous invitations were in fact contrived by the gods themselves, because the gods get bored with men who have no stories." ('The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony' p 387)
ASSAULT OF ANGELS
The mind trembles from the assault of angels;
Running in familiar light it sees the sea,
It remembers the dark subway and the lost fields of childhood,
It remembers the loneliness of first love and the end of a summer;
These are familiar and small.
But the assault of angels is more terrible; angels are invisible,
Angels cast no shadow, and their unpredicted motion
Moves the familiar shadows into light.
Angels cannot burn the fingers: unacknowledged,
They pass unseen. No one will ever know.
Refuse them; they have no claim to charity,
To ignore them offers the key to omniscience.
Angels breed darkness out of light, angels rejoice
In things we hate and fear.
Angels are the launching of a new ship,
Angels offer to inhabit the landscape of your body,
Angels will let you grow as a child grows,
They are your enemy; they will destroy you.
And a time comes when a man is afraid to grow,
A time when the house is comfortable and narrow.
A time when the spirit of life contracts.
Angels are at the door: admit them now.
Stills from 'Wings of Desire' - my Desert Island Film. My family bought me the film in 1988, before the collapse of the Wall and all of it's huge significances.
Bruno Ganz as 'Damiel' at the Siegessäule (The Victory Column celebrating the Prussian defeat of the Danish in 1846)
Solveig Donmartin - who brings Damiel to Earth. I think of another obvious German association in Goethe and the final line of his 'Faust' (sixty years in the writing don't forget): 'The Eternal Feminine Leads us On'
Last Aid from Damiel to a dying motorcyclist
As well as being invisible, the angels are able to listen to the thoughts of others: this man realizes that it is within his power to change himself.
'Cassiel' (Otto Sander) listens to Homer's (Curt Bois) account of his lost world, the history of Prussia itself.
Peter Falk - as 'der Filmstar' - and as fallen angel, addresses the invisible Damiel:
'You see..... I can't see you but I know you are there...'
'The Secret Door' - a painting of a dream I had some thirty or so years ago - when we lived in Germany.
I wish I could buy you all a copy of the film!
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