translated by Dominika Braithwaite
e-mail: niklok(at)wp.pl
There is a fire above us today – a dark blue thorn of dawn,
its glint is like a blade. Time passes by lakes,
azures – long ice tounges of glaciers.
And though it’s morning, the seventh day – I am not here.
I am waiting till the night completely explodes,
so I can take your rib.
A different take on Andersen
Let’s not forget about the aquatic plants,
if there’s singing to be heard it has to come from grassweed
as thick as the web between her fingers.
Out of all the common species
we choose rush – the easiest to spread
over the moist pastures, the quickest
to walk over to the meadow, when the river
and poking the water with a stick in search of one’s reflection gets boring.
What we want to see uncovers itself only to a few.
One can’t have an unclear conscience,
but can catch crayfish and goldfish instead.
Like a first atonement.
The history of time
where are all my dead ancestors,
the ones I never met and never will,
even if they looked like the portraits on the walls.
were do they swim now and where do they float -
toothless or lame, carrying in their faces
the sentence of time.
where are the ones writing poems
without knowing the letters,
spreading from mouth to mouth the stories of tribes,
housewifes digging in soil
men wiping off sweat -
yard after yard getting closer in their lives to eternity,
that we will not experience.
where are their reason and wisdom
ordering everything according to the law of nature?
their honesty and their vodka are gone -
both digested by time, that today
roars.
Absorption
Saturn devours his children carefully chewing every bite,
he opens his mouth wide to fit in his sons’ shoulders,
his daughters’ hips. Death doesn’t oppose his hands.
I am scared of the face pictured by Goya -
titan forcing down mouthfuls of meat, that’s genetically
similar to his, should inspire disgust.
Who would he be for his children, if he didn’t devour them?
What would the picture look like without those eyes,
screaming that nothing’s fair?
I am Saturn’s daughter. Spinning on the orbit constantly eats me up.
If only I was a comet, Simpleton -
I could fall as long as necessary.
A bowler hat poem
your face – the shape of a bowl
thick soup to hang your spoon in
like a hat or even a good morning
thrown in the hallway between the mirror
and departure
arrival
squatting
your face – a derelict building
sharp features of words on the
landing when you run out of it
not to come back
long time since you’ve been here
carrying your conscience in a ladle
on a fork
in a pocket
in your hair
your words are sharper
than your features
if you get a closer look
if you leaf through them
they are like a hat on the doorstep
or even a good morning
we’re back here again
rolling ourselves in
swelling
freezing from inside
thousands of people swarm with charlie
to the klondike
Thread. Metaphysics with a dog
outside the window God’s voice
blowing up the clouds
he also uses ground-to-air missiles
the fire and forget type
the poor human race
that seems not to understand his words
from the very beginning
must have annoyed him
when the sky is flashing
the dog runs under the duvet
and squeaks
it seems to me then
that only he knows
what’s really coming
Waterproofing with Madonna’s song in the background
The fete brings a storm and same as last year goes the story
to the rough clouds, hungry for our skin,
we say: Sorry
We’re scuffling over that jam open sandwich -
you’re swallowing it slowly as if you couldn’t, didn’t want it ever again.
Intimacy sleeps in a matchbox – shared tobacco,
shared bed, and before the mirror -
vials, bric-a-brac, dregs.
Jadwiga Grabarz, born 1986, Poland. Published her first collection of poems “Gaszenie do snu” in 2008. Co-author of „Bzyk wiersze nie dla dzieci” book of poems nominated by readers of Esensja magazine for the award as a book of the year 2008. Winner of several national and international poetry competitions. She has her poetry published in the following magazines: Dziennik Polski, Portret, Poezja Dzisiaj, Znaj, artPapier, Cegła, PKPzin, sZAFa, Odra, Modowo.pl, Cartographer and in many anthologies. She comes from a village in former Galicia.
