Home > Work > Selected Poems: 1931 - 2004
1 " Yet falling in love is not the same as being able to love. "
― Czesław Miłosz , Selected Poems: 1931 - 2004
2 " Human reason is beautiful and invincible.No bars, no barbed wire, no pulping of books,No sentence of banishment can prevail against it.It puts what should be above things as they are.It does not know Jew from Greek nor slave from master. "
3 " Meaning"- When I die, I will see the lining of the world.The other side, beyond bird, mountain, sunset.The true meaning, ready to be decoded.What never added up will add up,What was incomprehensible will be comprehended.- And if there is no lining to the world?If a thrush on a branch is not a sign,But just a thrush on the branch? If night and dayMake no sense following each other?And on this earth there is nothing except this earth?- Even if that is so, there will remainA word wakened by lips that perish,A tireless messenger who runs and runsThrough interstellar fields, through the revolving galaxies,And calls out, protests, screams. "
4 " A Song for the End of the World"On the day the world endsA bee circles a clover,A fisherman mends a glimmering net.Happy porpoises jump in the sea,By the rainspout young sparrows are playingAnd the snake is gold-skinned as it always should be.On the day the world endsWomen walk through the fields under their umbrellas,A drunkard grows sleepy at the edge of a lawn,Vegetable peddlers shout in the streetAnd a yellow-sailed boat comes nearer the island,The voice of a violin lasts in the airAnd leads into a starry night.And those who expected lightning and thunderAre disappointed.And those who expected signs and archangels’ trumpsDo not believe it is happening now.As long as the sun and the moon are above,As long as the bumblebee visits a rose,As long as rosy infants are bornNo one believes it is happening now.Only a white-haired old man, who would be a prophetYet is not a prophet, for he’s much too busy,Repeats while he binds his tomatoes:There will be no other end of the world,There will be no other end of the world. "
