Wislawa Szymborska (1923-2012) was a Polish poet, essayist, translator and recipient of the 1996 Nobel Prize in Literature. Her poetry is full of wisdom, wit, and a haunting, surreal quality. One of her major themes is differentness, or otherness: the lack of mutual comprehension between different conditions, species, kinds of matter.
Poetry
Spring 2001
The Silence of Plants
From the Polish. The one-sided acquaintance between me, and you, is proceeding, in a way. I know every leaflet, every petal, ear, cone, stalk; your cycles of life—your […]
Poetry
Spring 2001
Conversation with a Stone
From the Polish. I knock on the stone's door. —It's me, let me in. I want to come inside, look all around; breathe you in. —Go away—says […]
Poetry
Spring 2001
Three Words Most Strange
From the Polish. As I utter the word Future, the first syllable has already slipped into the past. As I utter the word Silence, I shatter it. As […]
Poetry
Spring 2001
Reality Requires
From the Polish. Reality requiresthat we speak of these things: life rolls on, near Cannae, and Borodino, in Kosovo, Guernica. A petrol station stands on a little Jericho square: in […]
Poetry
Spring 2001
Atlantis
From the Polish. They existed—or not— on an island, or no-island: sea, or no-sea, swallowed them up—or not. Was there anyone to love? anyone to fight? Everything happened, or […]
Poetry
Spring 2001
Cat in an Empty Apartment
From the Polish. Die—you can't do that to a cat. What is it to do, the cat, in an empty apartment, but climb the walls, and rub against the […]
Poetry
Winter 1998
Pursuit
From the Polish. I know that silence will greet me, and yet. No hubbub, no trumpets, no ovation, and yet. Neither bells of alarm, nor alarm itself. I’m not even […]
Poetry
Winter 1998
A Thank-You Note
From the Polish. I owe a lot to those I do not love. The release in accepting they are closer to other people. Joy that I am not wolf to […]
Poetry
Winter 1998
To the Heart on Sunday
From the Polish. Thank you, my heart, for not dawdling, for keeping a move onwithout flatteries, without reward from innate diligence. You’ve got seventy merits per minute. Every contraction is […]
In Memoriam
Reality Requires; Three Words Most Strange
First published in The Kenyon Review, New Series, Vol. 23, No. 2, (Spring, 2001). Translated from Polish by Vuyelwa Carlin Reality Requires Reality requires that we speak of these things: […]