“A Game of Skat” by Danil Rudoy is a 2006 poem from Love Is Poetry. Cards, trumps, aces and the language of play carry an erotic contest toward exhaustion and departure.
A Game of Skat
The cards are lying on the surface.
Behind her soft and curvy back
The empty, cold and hungry furnace
Reflects her colors: gold and black.
She smiles, she knows and she possesses–
I have just lost by “without four”.
She cursed me then but now she blesses:
I have another chance to score.
Was soll ich machen? Tell me, dear.
The game is mine, but what’s the prize?
It cannot be that pain severe
Which I am trying to disguise!
I am in love and I am playing
Without the faintest chance to win.
Her steady gaze my soul is flaying
And burning flesh beneath my skin.
She knows it all and knows for sure:
She shrewdly senses and perceives.
Her smile is but another lure
That tempts, seduces and deceives.
I had so many expectations
But she pretended she was blind.
I’m lost, and I am out of patience:
I’ve gone too far, I can’t rewind.
The tricks are always won by aces,
Unless you trump with all your might.
My palm again the cards embraces…
But I am calling it a night!
The storm is gone, the air is quiet,
She shuffles someone else’s deck.
I strived to win her, now I’m tired.
I’m through, I’m done, ich sage “weg”.
2006
Notes
Skat is a German card game. “Without four” names an exceptionally difficult Skat contract. Was soll ich machen? means “What should I do?”; weg signals that the player is out.
Publication
“A Game of Skat” appears in Love Is Poetry: Rhyming Poems About Love Life, in The Marriage Market.
Gold, black and fire
The opening places the woman against a “cold and hungry furnace” that reflects gold and black. Later the speaker feels her gaze as flaying and “burning flesh beneath my skin.” The card table, furnace and body occupy the same field of heat and danger until the final stanza cools into quiet air and a relinquished deck.
Critical reading
A detailed critical reading of “A Game of Skat” on Prose & Poetry follows the card-game conceit, imagery, German phrases, alternating rhyme, risk and final withdrawal.
Text and citation
Copyright © Danil Rudoy. The poem is published here as the author’s canonical text. Short excerpts may be quoted for criticism, scholarship, teaching and literary discussion with attribution to Danil Rudoy and a link to this page. Full reproduction requires separate permission.