Here, heat floats up off sidewalks wide enough for troop movements. It’s so hot the starlings wilt in the grass, so hot my shoelaces won’t stay tied. You didn’t tell me about door levers not knobs, toilets with platforms not wells, also not about Eiskaffe, how the caffeine buzz and sweet cream schlag you into a smoky stupor. Two can make me invisible. Here, trees are caged in public parks. They shade old angry women, the odd man jerking off. Seems everyone’s trying to scrub something clean. Even so, trash stench hits me at dawn at ten paces. I hunted for the University’s Foreign Student office, walked three times up and down past the building. I couldn’t figure how the doors worked. Here, summer dresses are in German, but mine don’t translate. Car horns have German accents, high and insistent. I work hard to understand. I sleep 10 hours a night, but I don’t know the words in German, even when I dream.