beyond the mountains and forests he died in omnis
and a great fog embraced his tenacious body
from behind the clouds his rhyming frog-croaks
MR COGITO ON A SET TOPIC: “FRIENDS DEPART”
In memory of Wtadystaw Walczykiewicz
1
In his youth
Mr Cogito prided himself
on an unheard-of wealth
of friends
some beyond the mountains
rich in talents and goodness
others
like the devoted Wladyslaw
poor as church mice
but all of them
what are called
friends
common tastes
ideals
twin characters
and back then
in the primordial times
of happy bloody youth
Mr Cogito
had reason to think
that the black-rimmed letter
informing them of his death
would touch them
to the quick
they would come
from all directions
old-fashioned as if out of an old journal
dressed
in starched grief
they would
go with him
along a path
strewn with pebbles
amid
cypresses
box hedge
pine trees
and would throw
damp sand
a bouquet
on the heap
2
with the inexorable
passing of years
his count of friends
shrank
they went off
in pairs
in groups
one by one
some paled like wafers
lost earthly dimensions
and suddenly
or gradually
emigrated
to the sky
others
chose maps
of rapid navigation
or chose safe ports
and from then on
Mr Cogito
lost them
from his field of vision
Mr Cogito
doesn’t blame anyone for it
he knew that’s how it had to be
it’s the natural order of things
(he could add speaking of himself
that the lapse of enduring feelings
raw history
and the necessity of clear choices
determined
the end of some friendships)
Mr Cogito
isn’t grumbling
isn’t complaining
isn’t blaming anyone
things are a little
lonelier
But clearer as well
3
Mr Cogito
easily accepted
the departure of many friends
as if it were
a natural law
of extinction
there are still a few left
tried by fire and water
with those who left
the walls of the Empirical Empire
for good
he maintains close and enduringly
warm relations
they stand at his back
watching him intently
absolute but kindly
if they went
Mr Cogito
would fall
into the pit
of loneliness
it’s as if they form a backdrop
and from that living backdrop
Mr Cogito
emerges by a half step
a half step and no more
in religion there’s a term
the communion of saints
Mr Cogito
being far from saintly
keeps his step
motionless
and they are like a chorus
against the backdrop of that chorus
Mr Cogito
intones
his farewell
aria
MR COGITO’S APPOINTMENT BOOKS
To Zbigniew Zapasiewicz
1
Mr Cogito
at times flips through
his old pocket-size
appointment books
then he sets off
as if on a white steamer
for the past perfect tense
on the edge of the horizon
of his own elusive essence
he sees himself
in the far background
of a dark picture
Mr Cogito
feels as if
he had met
someone long deceased
or had indiscreetly read
somebody else’s diaries
he confirms without satisfaction
the iron necessity of Earth’s orbit
the order of the year’s seasons
the inexorable ticking of clocks
and the transient
interruptible line
of his existence
that memorable day
(his sweetheart’s name day)
the sun rose at exactly
six thirty-five
and set at eight twenty-one
but his memory
of the young lady
is foggy
barely a name
the color of her eyes
freckles
small hands
her laughter
not always appropriate
the calendar informs him
that there was a new moon
and so there must have been
but was she really there and he
and the garden and the cherries
2
Mr Cogito is unsettled by
notes of a personal nature
Hala.
Meet Leopold.
Passport application.
but descending deeper
into the self’s recesses
Mr Cogito
discovers months
left without marks
not a single note
even a banal one
like—underwear to laundry
—buy chives
no sign
no phone number
no address
Mr Cogito
knows what
ominous silence
can mean
he knows well
the weight
of blank
faded
pages
he could destroy that void
write in anything he wants
Mr Cogito
carefully preserves
gray-blue booklets
—like empty ammunition shells
—the chart of an absurd illness
—like the diary of a pogrom
ACHILLES. PENTHESILEA
When Achilles pierced Penthesilea’s breast with his short sword, he twisted it—as is proper—three times in the wound, and saw—in a sudden exaltation—that the queen of the Amazons was beautiful.
He laid her carefully on the sand, took off her heavy helmet, shook her hair loose, and delicately laid her hands on her chest. However, he did not have the courage to close her eyes.
He looked at her once more with a valedictory gaze and, as if compelled by a strange force, began to weep—as neither he himself nor any other hero of that war had ever wept—with a voice subdued and incantatory, low-pitched and helpless, resounding with lamentation and a cadence of remorse unknown to the son of Thetis. The vowels of that lament fell on Penthesilea’s neck, breast, and knees like leaves and wrapped themselves around her cooling body.
She herself was preparing for the Eternal Hunt in forests beyond. Her eyes not yet closed looked from far off at the victor with stubborn, clear blue
—loathing.
BLACK FIGURINE BY EKSEKIAS
Where is Dionysus sailing across a sea as red as wine
what islands does he seek under the sign of grapevines
The wine-drunk one doesn’t know—so nor do we—
where downstream the agile beechwood boat is sailing
TO CZESLAW MILOSZ
1
Above San Francisco Bay—the lights of the stars
at dawn mist which divides the world in two parts
who knows which is better weightier which worse
one must not think even in secret they’re the same
2
Angels descend from heaven
Halleluia
when he sets down
his slanted
azure-spaced
letters
ROVIGO
Rovigo station. Vague associations. A Goethe play
or something from Byron. I passed through Rovigo
so many times and just now for the umpteenth time
I understood in my inner geography it is a singular
place though it is certainly no match for Florence.
I never put a living foot down there. Rovigo was
always coming closer or receding into the distance
I lived then in the throes of a passion for Altichiero
of the San Giorgio Oratorium in Padua and also
for Ferrara which I loved because it reminded me
of the plundered city of my fathers. I lived torn
between the past and the present moment
crucified many times by time and by place
But nonetheless happy with a powerful faith
that the sacrifice would not be made in vain
Rovigo was not marked by anything in particular
it was a masterpiece of averageness straight roads
ugly houses but—depending on the train’s direction
just before or just after the city a mountain suddenly
rose up from a plain cut across by a red stone quarry
like a holiday cut of meat draped in sprigs of parsley
apart from that nothing to please hurt catch the eye
But it was after all a city of blood and stone like others
a city where a man died yesterday someone went mad
someone coughed hopelessly all night
AMID WHAT BELLS DO YOU APPEAR ROVIGO
Reduced to its station to a comma a crossed-out letter
nothing just the station—arrivi—partenze
and that is why I think of you Rovigo Rovigo
EPILOGUE TO A STORM
1998
GRANDMOTHER
my most saintly grandmother
in a long tight-fitting dress
buttoned up
with a countless number
of buttons
like an orchid
an archipelago
a constellation
I sit on her lap
and she tells me
the universe
from Friday
to Sunday
spellbound
I know everything—
—the one thing about herself
she won’t tell is her ancestry
grandmother Maria née Balaban
Maria of Bitter Experience
she tells me nothing
about the massacre
of Armenia
the Turkish massacre
she doesn’t want to deprive me
of a few more years of illusion
she knows I will live
to find out for myself
without words curses or tears
the rough
surface
and the pit
of the word
BREVIARY
Lord,
I give thanks to You for this whole jumble of life in which I have been drowning helplessly from time immemorial, dead set on a constant search for trifles.
Praise be to You, that you gave me unobtrusive buttons, pins, suspenders, spectacles, ink streams, ever hospitable blank sheets of paper, transparent covers, folders patiently waiting.
Lord, I give thanks to You for syringes with needles thick and hair-thin, bandages, every kind of Band-aid, the humble compress, thank you for the drip, for saline solutions, tubes and above all for sleeping pills with names like Roman nymphs,
which are good, for they invite, imitate, substitute for death.
BREVIARY
Lord,
grant me the ability to compose a long sentence, whose line, customarily from breath to breath, is a line spanned like a suspension bridge like a rainbow the alpha and omega of the ocean
Lord, grant me the strength and agility of those who build sentences long and expansive as a spreading oak tree, like a great valley; may they contain worlds, shadows of worlds, and worlds of dreams
may the main clause rule confidently over dependent clauses, control their course, a circuitous but expressive basso continuo, endure unmoved above the elements in motion, draw them to itself like a nucleus draws electrons by unseen laws of gravitation
I pray then for a long sentence, sculptured by the sweat of my brow, extending so far that in each there might be reflected the mirror image of a cathedral, a great oratorio, a tryptych,
and also animals mighty and minuscule, train stations, the heart brimming with sorrow, rocky cliffs, and the furrow of fate in the hand
BREVIARY
Lord
help us to imagine a fruit
a pure image of sweetness
and the touching of planes
those of dusk and dawn
fish from the sea’s folds
a bass of the pure depths
and also a girl
blind as destiny
a girl singing—bel canto
BREVIARY
Lord,
I know my days are numbered
there are not many of them left
Enough for me to gather the sand
with which they will cover my face
I will not have enough time
to render justice to the injured
or ask forgiveness of all those
who suffered evil at my hands
that is why my soul is grieved
my life
should come full circle
close like a well-built sonata
but now I see clearly
just before the coda
the broken chords
badly set colors and words
the din of dissonance
the tongues of chaos
why
was my life
not like circles on the water
welling from infinite depths
like an origin which grows
falls into layers rungs folds
to expire serenely
in your inscrutable lap
DALIDA
In the life of Mr Cogito
illustrated supplements
were a vital supplement
thanks to them
the lives of famous actors
princesses
belly dancers
held no secrets
for him
it was enough to hear
a few bars of a tune
to summon a gallery
of merciless portraits
illuminated by X-rays
from a poor childhood
through a dizzy career
to a death in oblivion
abandoned now
in vinyl record cemeteries
slightly smaller
than used-car cemeteries
thanks to them
he puzzles out
his life’s dates
without a miss
he is guarded
by Dalida
Halina Kunicka
Irena Santor
good witches
thanks to them
tyranny
was be
autified
by song
they ought to get
a word of thanks
a tender memory
a collective name
on the stone tablet
of an arduous life
I GAVE MY WORD
I was very young
and common sense told me
not to give my word
I could easily say
I’ll give it some thought
what’s the big hurry
it’s not a train schedule
I’ll give my word
after graduation
after military service
after I make a home
but time exploded
there was no before
there was no after
in the blinding present
you had to choose
so I gave my word
a word—
a noose round my neck
an ultimate word
in the rare moments
when everything is light
and becomes transparent
I think to myself:
“my word
how I’d like
to take my word back”
it doesn’t last for long
the world’s axis screeches
people pass away
as do landscapes
colored rings of time
but the word I gave
is stuck in my throat
DIANA
what business is it of mine
that these legs belonged
to a real-life princess
the rest was
hypothetical
what does it help
that these legs
when they still made up
an unimaginable whole
demanded
more care
then Nefertiti’s smile
than the model
of time and space
built at Greenwich
TWO PROPHETS. A VOICE TEST
From the white podium
of quilts pillows duvets
they address humanity
(part of it) in baby talk
and the rest of humanity
listens—doesn’t—forgets
this is how it welled up
the milky source of bindweed
dragon’s source of destruction
two prophets—a voice test
verily verily
you will not return to the smiling face of the apple
to the white gardens quietly burning
The Collected Poems Page 26