And now, now I should study, after all I’m no longer at school, after all I need to do something for the future, after all I’m already 17! And it’s just now that some lazy, awful apathy grips me, brr, I can’t be bothered to do anything at all now … Now I stand at the window and watch the wild ivy getting wet, look at various people moving in the street and think about their worries and how they feel. Or I look at the women and think about which one has already had intercourse and what did she look like then? Yes, this one is old and wrinkled, but she used to be young and then … and this one, how strange, and that one … it’s all laughable … poverty in its rags is laughable, people pinched with cold and hunger are laughable, and how laughable is the man afraid of the soldier, talking to him, smiling, standing at attention, bobbing…? An old man in front of a youth. And prisoners? Those swaying, blackened skeletons, how funny the way they rock on those spindly legs, and how squeaky and quiet their voices—they’re also laughable, laughable—it makes me feel faint. I go to the stove then, lean against it and daydream … Because what else is there to do? And even if there was, I can’t be bothered about anything anyway … I somehow, strangely, can’t be bothered about absolutely anything … Or maybe I can, yes! About dreams coming true … You will help me, Buluś and God.
OCTOBER 29, 1941, WEDNESDAY
All day yesterday and today I have wanted to talk to you. Yesterday I felt so bad, so sad and empty … I had this awful feeling of an “inability to act.” I thought about learning mathematics and shorthand writing, and a language; I wanted to do it with all my soul, but at the same time I knew that I wouldn’t raise a finger to do it, I knew my hands wouldn’t obey and I myself would turn out to be powerless. Mama is right. Someone always has to give me directions, order me around, force me into things, even if I myself want them. And now Mama’s far away again with Jarosia, and “the one for me,” in Buluś’s words, he can’t, because he has no power over me, and generally it’s not that … Now I’m sinking into some sort of stupor and what is it?—an aversion? I don’t think so. I was thinking yesterday and I said this to Nora, “You know, Norka, I’m tired of life.” This sentence coming out of a 17-year-old girl’s mouth amuses me, and it’s not accurate. It’s not life I’m tired of, because after all I haven’t really lived yet; I’m tired of anticipation, idleness, and maybe precisely the desire for life. Because not so long ago there was a time when I was intoxicated with sensual love, kisses, caresses, touches, and all this was enough for me, so much so that I forgot one can desire something more. Now? No! Now I have come to my senses. Have I rejected that? No! It’s equally important as what is now.
Don’t look for solace only in the senses
they burn bright as a flame, fade away just so
If you look to your comfort in learning, then hence it’s
where your thirst will be quenched, where your soul did go
Yes, that soul’s lying there, and not moving at all, though I myself often move away. I will give you an example, proof, or maybe not, not proof, well, judge for yourself. Yesterday at 5 p.m. I was supposed to go to Nora’s for an English lesson. It took me ages to set out, I was putting it off (anyway, Nora couldn’t have been at home yet). So I was all the more still, just watching the pretty, colorful, carefree film scenes. My dreams made up this film. And any moment would break the plot, so although the hands of the clock were rushing onward mercilessly, I didn’t leave my chair, what for? It would be like leaving the cinema during a screening. Still, I went. I went, but … not to Nora’s. I went, of all places, to Belania, to Helka, to Giza, those girls one meets most frequently, just those completely normal girls. I wanted to listen to their conversations, their thoughts, their plans; I went “for a bit of gossip.” The whole “gang” wasn’t there, only Belania. That was enough for me. Belania is, after all, the life and soul of the group, she’s the cleverest and most intelligent of them all. I came, I sat down, I listened to some news, then I told her what I knew, and I asked, “All right, so what do you talk about every day?” “Food,” says Belania. “What do you dream about?” “About once eating so much I can’t stand up.” Well, I knew everything then. Was I disappointed? Maybe not, to an extent I’d been prepared for it. I knew, and even agreed with Belania that it’s best to have four “sweethearts,” each of them of a different nationality. So I returned to my interrupted film. I really do prefer that to baked potatoes. It’s good that there’s something to tear me away from sorting out breakfast, lunch, dinner and breakfast again. I am glad, after all, to have my colorful, faraway film. Nora dreams too, but differently, in a more real, logical way. My fantasies are unrelated to everything, except, perhaps, my vivid, very vivid imagination. Maybe I never properly appreciated Nora. She is admirable. She’s eager to learn and there’s a readiness about her, but not just readiness—she does learn, she reads all she can (but never worthless books). Nora is a well-rounded person, the sort of girl you don’t meet anymore. She says she’s matured this year. I would say she’s even more noble now, because “suffering ennobles one,” and she’s been through so much—she even “didn’t dare to dream.” And here, again, a difference between our dreams. Norka, she’s so brave, after all she’s got nobody, she’s all alone (with that faraway “pretty boy”), and me, if I’d been alone, without Zygu? God forbid, maybe I’d break down, and maybe I’d do what she does … But no, I don’t want to! I just don’t have the strength. I would have to walk alone, and otherwise I can at least imagine that I’m supported by someone’s arm, by “His” arm. Will the war end soon, God grant us that. Tomorrow I’ll probably see Zygu, perhaps chat to you too. You will help me, Buluś and God.
NOVEMBER 3, 1941, MONDAY
Since we last saw each other I’ve often felt like sitting down with you and crying. I’ve felt so bad at times. Dido and Bimba are nervous and vent their whole anger on me, keep reminding me how they’ve deigned to let me stay with them etc. Parents would never say that to their own child, but they’re not my parents after all. So sometimes (when I wake from my fantasies) I am terrified by what’s happening around me. But this only lasts a moment and then I fall asleep again.
Buluś is there with Jarusia. They will come here to me. I’d like her to be with me, I want her to leave Warsaw (typhus), but I’m afraid of this stay. Buluś is so sensitive. She’d be very hurt by a statement like that. It hurts me too. I am strangely sensitive about it and I feel like great, great harm is done to me … In fact I don’t cry often—but I always cry when it happens. I’d like to snuggle into something warm and nice then, and settle into a comfy armchair, and throw those worries into a roaring fireplace, and soar again. Such is my catlike nature that I need warmth (yes, Buluś, you know), much, much warmth, all the more for how little I’ve experienced it in life. Because apart from you and Jarosia nobody in the world can give it to me. Maybe you’ll think—him? No, he gives a fire that explodes and dies down. I feel it, I feel it all, because I’m sensitive.
Guess who paid me a visit today? Ludwik! I’ve actually been thinking about him lately. Today he came over (by chance); we had a very lively two-hour conversation. He is perhaps prettier than last time and very handsome, dashingly stylish and well mannered, not especially educated and conceitedly vain. He talked of his victories and popularity, flirted with me from time to time and had the pleasant feeling that I was impressed. I was pleased with him etc. He probably noticed that I blushed when he came in, but that doesn’t matter, because it’s in my nature to blush and that’s that. Well, but Ludwik doesn’t know this. Anyway, it was nice to chat. I’d like to have some company already, ours, kindred.
I’m learning French now and reading books (quite good) and Nora and I are studying ancient history. Apart from that I do nothing, I don’t listen to what people say, I prefer to listen to “birds in the bush” chirping.
When Ludwik was casting coquettish glances at me, I didn’t react, don’t think some other eyes have overwhelmed me, I’ve just got used to it. Ah, if only they could c
ome as soon as possible!
Zygu hasn’t come on Thursday or today. I wonder what is stopping him, but really I don’t. Today I forgot myself that he was supposed to come. But on Saturday … I think he came, yes, wearing a winter coat, brr … He brought such a chill … So, Buluś, when will you come to your poor, lonely orphan and non-orphan? You will help me, Buluś and God. A fireplace is the pinnacle of my dreams? And how!!!
There’s a blizzard raging outside
All you see is a white cloud of snow
All the world, all the people, each soul,
Snow and wind are beginning to hide …
Someone weaves all their dreams in a shawl
Or remembers, and then smiles sweet and wide
There’s a fire cracking warmly inside
You can wrap up in tales, stay, don’t go
This is my tiny little dream home
where my soul always yearns to find rest
a home full of pale yellowing memories
a hearth full of motherly warmth
A cold night, there’s a big blizzard on
In my home it is cozy and bright
from old dreams, little lives being born
I can put them to sleep, rocking light
Fetch some wood so the fire’s not gone
And my worries can fade in the night
This morning our grandma
sat herself today
reading a thick old notebook
she can’t put away.
She’s been reading squiggles
filling page after page,
nodding and then grumbling
“foolish, youthful age”
she’s been turning pages
crossed out, scribbled on,
with faded hearts—which could be red
but the ink’s all gone
from all long ago,
a time since so great …
Our grandma’s been sitting,
reading date by date.
Sometimes she would smile,
take another look,
say again, “oh, the youth”
and smile at her book.
The grandkids wouldn’t know it, but the book’s not done
Among these old pages
A former grandma lives on
They won’t know that from that page can waft, flow, or spurt
tears that don’t turn bitter
griefs that do not hurt.
NOVEMBER 4, 1941, TUESDAY
I’m glad that’s what I’m like
Little, round, and stout
because if I were slender
I’d fly up like on a cloud.
I’d fly up far away
Chasing dreams around
Then what force would there be
Pulling me back to ground?
Buluś…? Zyguś…? Life…?
I like it when a wide road is rocking
Under the weight of the trucks
When a shrill street-side silence
Is pierced by a claxon’s blast
As the steady rhythmic shocks
Shake a line and a house and a lamp
And the hum and the speed hang above us
Like a current rushing past
Till the trucks press the tarmac and shove its
lazy flow to each side till it spreads
And flows off the road and it sweats
In this frost
NOVEMBER 6, 1941, THURSDAY
I have such pangs of conscience, and I’m so upset! It’s all because of Bimba, anyway the fault is entirely mine. I was actually only five minutes late—such a short time—and yet so long. It’s been a whole week now. God, let me make it all right on Saturday. Will I, will we meet? I am to copy poems with Nora now. You will help me, Buluś and God.
NOVEMBER 7, 1941, FRIDAY18
Again a day came when all former worries faded. Ghetto! That word is ringing in our ears, it terrifies, it torments. We don’t know what will happen to us, where we’ll go and what they’ll let us take. God, I believe in You, that wherever we’ll be, You will not desert us. Last night everyone was packing, we were ordered to leave our apartments before 2 p.m. with 25 kilograms of possessions. Maybe there will be a ghetto, but it seems that we will definitely have to move out of the main streets either way. God, I know You heard me a moment ago, when I was petrified and my heart was fluttering so!
At 10:30 last night, suddenly the doorbell rang, and who was there? The police! I pressed my hands to my face then and I called You, oh God, and You heard me. It was a policeman from our old village, from Torskie,* and he let himself be bribed. I reminded him of the good times, the friends, the revels, and somehow it worked. And now I’m asking You, oh Great One, I’m asking you—I, a speck of dust, I without father or mother here, a poor one … If those lonely, desolate voices have any power, then listen to my call, too!
Today I got a postcard from Mama. It touched and moved me strangely. Because in all the turmoil of the day I felt that I have someone who loves me, who cares about me. At the same time I felt the powerlessness of that love; my poor faraway Mama can’t help me at all. Mama, I know what you’re going through there, but know that I’m suffering here too and going through things that can make one’s hair go white. But I believe in you and God. He has saved you from so many disasters, led you through so many dangers, because I was praying then and begging Him: save her, save my mother! He listened to me then, so He will help me, help us now too. Ah, if I only knew what’s better?! For you to be with us, or over there with Jarosia? I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know! “I’m sending Renusia a package”—so God has not forsaken me yet if someone out there is saying this, because the world is alien and cold, and this is heartfelt, like my prayers are heartfelt. My Beloved Mama, I never think you’re hurting me, even if you said as much to me, I wouldn’t believe you. Because your letters, postcards, your words exude love and concern, and something as warm as—I don’t know. God, listen to my prayer, solve the puzzle You have given to people. I hope Zygu comes tomorrow, so that I’ll have someone to complain to. Help us, God, and bless us.
NOVEMBER 8, 1941, SATURDAY
First and foremost thanks be to You, and secondly I shall deliberate over an issue brought up today by Zygu. I need to consider it carefully, mull it over and understand. This is how it started! It started with him saying that I’m childish, that I’ve got a child’s mentality, that I have not matured psychically to the level of my 17 years. Actually at first he said that it’s usually the boy who’s not mature, doesn’t think about the future or marriage, only the girl does. And in our “relationship” it is different, i.e., the opposite. But I don’t think it is opposite at all—I do think seriously. So I told him he doesn’t know me at all. Then Z took the offensive and accused me of being like a doll that he plays with and if he presses a button, it makes me react; he said I’m passive, that he didn’t know this until our first “real” meeting. He kept adding that it’s not an accusation and that I shouldn’t consider it a reproach. Finally he said I’m like the North Sea, or the Arctic Ocean, or ice, that I have no initiative, in a word—I lack temperament! He said that his friends had already mentioned this to him (ridiculous, but I’ve known that since the beginning). He set, say, Rena K. (whom he apparently finds attractive) as an example, or rather didn’t set her as an example but compared us, said that it’s impossible to talk to me seriously about this, that it would be easier with Irka. He asked whether I have anything against him or if there’s anything I don’t like. I told him that yes, indeed, but I can say that to everyone else, but not him, and that he’s right—there are many things he doesn’t know, but I’m not to blame for that, at least not for all of it. Why? And how do I explain that I’ve gone through various periods ever since we first met. You know it best; you know them all, dear Diary. Wouldn’t you agree, then, that I’ve been crazy for … love, that I sometimes clutched at the table so as not to fling my arms around him, that I had sleepless nights,
tortured, tormented by the senses? But you see, this has passed somehow, at first it was hard to hold back, then it got easier, and then not at all. And then, back then, couldn’t I have told you all that you blame me for today? Couldn’t I have accused you of the same thing? Be fair, Zygu! It is possible that back then those old rules stood in my way, those great-grandma-ish opinions about love and a girl’s attitude to it. But May came and I was, again, ready for … anything, and you were “passive” again. Then I waited for it impatiently, partly in desire, partly in curiosity. And then (on that first June night—it can’t be called that), when you judged me, I judged you and … I was disappointed … Know that it was you who made me timid with your timid kiss. But it’s true that I’ve unearthed this piece of information from the unconscious and only now too. Or maybe even when Belania asked me, “But the question is whether Zygu is a good kisser,” and I said, “I don’t know.” But that doesn’t mean I didn’t love you then. I loved then and now, and always, only I had to cast off what overwhelmed me after you left, and anyway I am not reproaching you either, just telling the truth, to clarify misunderstandings, as you say yourself. But it needs to be said that you are not a good psychologist if you want to achieve a better result by what you said. In fact, in order to understand each other we’d need to talk seriously, unashamed by anything, we’d need to reach back into the past, etc. etc. And I can’t bear to do that yet, maybe in 2–3 years, as you say, so perhaps you’re right after all when you say I’ve got a childish mentality? That is the whole misfortune right there—you are usually right, and even when you’re not, you somehow end up being right after all. And as for me, words are definitely not my forte, at most I can write everything down, and this happens only after you leave … Naturally you’ll tell all this to Nora, as you’d guessed she will say I’m right. Ah, if Buluś were here too, she’d understand me. I could also show this … What had been written here absolutely does not stand anymore, so I erased it. I’m going to the Teich girl’s tomorrow with the latest poems. Here’s to feelings. You will help me, Buluś and God.
Renia's Diary Page 18