I trace my own search among the street names
from the Ägeri See, to the Dorf Platz, past the old school
where my great grandfather Andreas Iten
taught Jost Ribary how to read music
along Oberdorf Straß past the Molki,
the Hoselädeli. Hoping to see the ghost
Of my family home.
My family home?
If the house still stood, I would search for discolouration
in the wood, where two carpets once lay, bedside.
The first two carpets my Grosi ever made,
my Dädi was eleven, er hed au knöpft, he also knotted.
They lay bedside until they were sent to Tasmania
alongside kerosene lamps wrapped in white linen.
Linen, I like to think was once a wedding gift to fill the chest of drawers, 1931
which travelled alongside the memories and makings of a migrant home, 1992.
I search the knots of one of the carpets, now in my home,
in Alice Springs. I ask where are my knots?
Who are all these people
Who know me by my Papi’s name.
My Grandfather. Telegrafiste Iten. Toni Iten.
Who are all these people
Who know me because we left?
They say ‘zumene wilde ort’ for a wild place.
My Dädi never let them believe anything else,
I know Papi treasured his time spent in the forest, most.
Papi died in his bed
Grosi had left his bedside to get him a milk coffee
my Mum, a Kenyan born British Australian
washed the linen
within three years Grosi followed her youngest son’s family
to the wild place, and returned to Unterägeri a decade on, resting.
Grosi, gli fanged mir ah mit Wienachtsgüetzli bache, Chräbeli, Mailänderli, Spitztbuebe.
Grosi, im Moses ihm sie’s Kind isch geschter i d’Wält cho! En Bueb… de Pablo Léon
This poem is written and spoken in English and in the Swiss German dialect
of Unterägeri, Kanton Zug, Central Switzerland