NO TITLE REQUIRED BY Wislawa Szymborska (Translated from the Polish by Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh) It’s come to this: I’m sitting under a tree, beside a river on a sunny morning. It’s an insignificant event and won’t go down in history. It’s not battles and pacts, whose motives are scrutinized, or noteworthy tyrannicides. And […]
WISŁAWA SZYMBORSKA
R.I.P. WISŁAWA ZYMBORSKA
TORTURES Nothing has changed.The body is a reservoir of pain;it has to eat and breathe the air, and sleep;it has thin skin and the blood is just beneath it;it has a good supply of teeth and fingernails;its bones can be broken; its joints can be stretched.In tortures, all of this is considered. Nothing has changed.The […]
BURNING DOWN THE HOUSE
Don’t you hate when your worst nightmare actually occurs? I’ve been fumbling along with this new housemate situation, watching all my oldest childhood triggers being triggered: my conviction that I’m not “allowed” to take up a lot of room, express a need, or make a mistake. And yesterday, having finally arranged my room in more […]