The English Wikipedia entry for “monostich” is decidedly lame: neither example cited is the least poetic. The German article gives only a single example, albeit a good one.
„Blumen reicht die Natur, es windet die Kunst sie zum Kranze“
-- Goethe
I don’t have quite the ear to write such things in German; but the other day, as I was reading Ernst Fischer’s Erinnerungen und Reflexionen (1969), certain phrases began sich vorzuheben from the text, although his memoir is as much Geschichte as Belletristik. And so, by way of finger-exercise, herewith some expressions that struck me. They’re not quite monostichs, but they’re on the way. These stem from his chapter on the sickening end of the Great War. I have tweaked the formatting but not changed the words.
einige torkelten lallend umher,
andere hingen mit grünen Gesichtern
über den Rohren
der Haubitzen, kotzten
~
Trab, Galopp, Trab, Galopp,
holterdiepolter, -- undplötzlichwiralle
h-OCHgeworfen
~
«Kadettaspirant Fischer !» …
… Durch das Summen des Raumes der Ruf.
~
Das Lauern, das Lauschen …
~
Ansonsten aber fütterten / immer noch alte Herren/ im Stadtpark die Eichhörnchen,
oder zeichneten mit ihren Stöcken / Figuren
in Sand und Schnee
And, the opening sentence of the chapter “Brief an Anny”:
Silbrig
feucht ist die Luft,
und so nah das Gebirg,
dass ich das Fell seiner Wälder,
die Haut seiner Wiesen
mit Händen zu streicheln
vermag
Hm, this reminds me a lot of Dada, for example Jandl's classic "Ottos Mops" (of which the three last verses are "ottos mops kommt // ottos mops kotzt // otto: ogottogott"). Anyone who is afraid of contamination of bourgeois culture should can take this as yet another confirmation of approval. I myself see culture as something organic, something that grows and changes, so to me this rather offers a fascinating example of how patterns in culture evolve. Another example is the emergence of comic-book references and even lingo in so-called serious literature.
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