Wizardry of Words

Stan Zumbiel reads at SPC'S 

Hot Poetry in the Park, June 18

—Photo by Michelle Kunert, Sacramento
 

ENCOUNTER
—Czeslaw Milosz

We were riding through frozen fields in a wagon at dawn.

A red wing rose in the darkness.

And suddenly a hare ran across the road.

One of us pointed to it with his hand.

That was long ago. Today neither of them is alive,

Not the hare, nor the man who made the gesture.

O my love, where are they, were are they going,

The flash of a hand, streak of movement, rustle of pebbles.

I ask not out of sorrow, but in wonder.

(trans. from the Polish by Czeslaw Milosz and Lillian Vallu)

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DEDICATION

—Czeslaw Milosz

You whom I could not save

Listen to me.

Try to understand this simple speech as I would be ashamed of another.

I swear, there is in me no wizardry of words.

I speak to you with silence like a cloud or a tree.

What strengthened me, for you was lethal.

You mixed up farewell to an epoch with the beginning of a new one,

Inspiration of hatred with lyrical beauty,

Blind force with accomplished shape.

Here is the valley of shallow Polish rivers. And an immense bridge

Going into white fog. Here is a broken city,
And the wind throws the screams of gulls on your grave

When I am talking with you.

What is poetry which does not save

Nations or people?
A connivance with official lies,

A song of drunkards whose throats will be cut in a moment,

Readings for sophomore girls.

That I wanted good poetry without knowing it,

That I discovered, late, its salutary aim,

In this and only this I find salvation.

They used to pour millet on graves or poppy seeds

To feed the dead who would come disguised as birds.

I put this book here for you, who once lived

So that you should visit us no more.

_______________________

PREPARATION

—Czeslaw Milosz

Still one more year of preparation. Tomorrow at the latest I'll start working on a great book

In which my century will appear as it really was.

The sun will rise over the righteous and the wicked.

Springs and autumns will unerringly return,

In a wet thicket a thrush will build his nest lined with clay

And foxes will learn their foxy natures.

And that will be the subject, with addenda. Thus: armies

Running across frozen plains, shouting a curse

In a many-voiced chorus; the cannon of a tank

Growing immense at the corner of a street; the ride at dusk

Into a camp with watchtowers and barbed wire.

No, it won't happen tomorrow. In five or ten years.

I still think too much about the mothers

And ask what is man born of woman.

He curls himself up and protects his head

While he is kicked by heavy boots; on fire and running.

He burns with bright flame; a bulldozer sweeps him into a clay pit.

Her child. Embracing a teddy bear. Conceived in ecstasy.

I haven't learned yet to speak as I should, calmly.

______________________

A SONG ON THE END OF THE WORLD
—Czeslaw Milosz

On the day the world ends

A bee circles a clover,

A fisherman mends a glimmering net.

Happy porpoises jump in the sea,

By the rainspout young sparrows are playing

And the snake is gold-skinned as it should always be.

On the day the world ends

Women walk through the fields under their umbrellas,

A drunkard grows sleepy at the edge of a lawn,

Vegetable peddlers shout in the streeet

And a yellow-sailed boat comes nearer the island,

The voice of a violin lasts in the air

And leads into a starry night.

And those who expected lightning and thunder

Are disappointed.

And those who expected signs and archangels' trumps

Do 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 born

No one believes it is happening now.

Only a white-haired old man, who would be a prophet

Yet 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.

Winter, 1944

(trans. from the Polish by Tony Milosz)

______________________

Today's LittleNip:

In a room where people unanimously maintain a conspiracy of silence, one word of truth sounds like a pistol shot.
 

—Czeslaw Milosz
 

______________________
 

—Medusa
 

 Neil O'Neill reads at SPC'S 

Hot Poetry in the Park, June 18

—Photo by Michelle Kunert, Sacramento