Mårran

this little happiness of mine that seems to me in every moment.

today was again so very bright, this time I watched the light here, in the countryside. strange smoke, very extensive, maybe coming from the grave lights, maybe just from the October. vast space full of sunlight, long shades. sounds more and more muffled. the first snow is coming, they say, with their voices full of reverence and fear; they want to see the Groke and yet they're afraid of it.
and so am I.
the light so final and glaring, it's beautiful, but it's extreme, I'm afraid of the threshold and the new paragraph, I keep on searching my serenity.

I'm interested in the view, the field and the balk, the quality of wind and multi-layered structure of silence. I can feel it pulsating in my stomach and to have this eternal hideout up here is like knowing there's always a safety net underneath, when I walk the Warsaw line. it's all very lyrical and I don't want to be pretentious; sarcastic neologisms that bud in my head when I'm in the city are much easier to defend. here is the tender place and emotions are like skating on thin ice, and then it's difficult to get into communication here, these places are more about being quiet. micro world, most beautiful prison. feels like I've always wanted to meditate through it all, work on it with my senses, but there was never enough time, body, attention. my legs are so astride. and I don't seem to know what is an illusion and what is real, because the truth of this Masovian plain and the Warsaw truth are two separate things. both in black and white.
I need to calm down.

P.s. I love, endlessly.

loved by the author

"The woman translator... is not simply subordinated, she is not the author's secretary. She is also the one who is loved by the author and on whose basis alone writing is possible. Translation is writing; that is, it is not translation only in the sense of transcription. It is a productive writing called forth by the original text."

Jacques Derrida

red and gold

October is getting covered by the mist, but the low light won't stop filter through. Something immense and full keeps me alive; it keeps my pace fast and feeds my self-contained, lasting love without any particular addressee. I do everything I can to remain calm. Light grey landscapes of Warsaw, the wind blows, women are taking their gloves out of their wardrobes. Warm colors are moving lower and lower, from up on the trees to right under our feet, because this city has seen so many kings and queens, and each of them thought their skyscraper was the highest.
Hold on, hold on and don't forget that most of the things that make that fuss aren't really important. Find the core and calm it. Don't let yourself be misled. Don't hurt. Yourself.

''I remember you so fondly'", said the Queen

In the theater foyer I met the Queen – like I do every year, when in the autumn time beautiful women marked by the dark stigma of literature gather up to watch the festival plays. men do, too.
she showed herself the same as I remembered her: petite and subdued, in her tiny court shoes, with her eyes focused – that's why I always saw resemblance between her and Szymborska: on the one hand, cynical bitterness of a badly intelligent person who might have had experienced a lot, on the other, this stubborn, irremovable element of girlishness, the sparkle, the cheerful contrariness, which work so refreshing cause they won't let her get used to the world in its bizarre form.
on the first day, only a greeting – she was just dialling her daughter's number.
on the second day, I sat on a hassock next to her. She gave me her characteristic close look; no matter what is the distance between you and her, you get a feeling that for a moment her mind is being to you, she's sitting and thinking to you, but not like the professor in Ferdydurke did, although this is precisely the context we share, no, she's becoming for someone and to someone in a most friendly and endearing way. she asked me an awful lot of questions, to which I responded with that verbal diarrhea of mine; thousands of words and none of them was what I wanted it to be. you look so good, she said, and then she ran away, pretending she had to. and I wasn't sure any more, whether I was really the only one, for whom this accidental meeting was so special, so damn special that it was almost unbearable.
or maybe I was the only one, indeed. one's opinion of themselves shall not be too high.
having left the theater, I felt like crying. that woman, that beautiful one, that distant one, about whose death I dreamt just a few nights before. see you next year in the theater. you, the belle.

yet again tricky

if chasing after those who don't give a shit and running away from those who think I'm so amazing they kinda want to be like me was a competition, I'd be the freakin champion.

"I'm your good old friend. well, maybe not good. but a friend", said She.

I'm the background girl. I'm the support girl. I'm the attention girl. but I can only hope that the few people I care about are safe tonight.

yes, I said September was amazing, as it was indeed, because although it might seem vampiric, I need human matter to be happy, not to slow down, to push myself forward. but I have to be honest with myself and admit that I'm only hiding what makes me uneasy, not solving the whole thing. cause today I realized I'm not able to search for serenity in open spaces, landscapes and silence any more. since last spring I've been jamming something inside me with loud music, alcohol, smoking; with people, again and again, thousands of gestures, words, associations; meetings, events; with concepts that absorb my attention and won't let me go down into the deep structure as there's so much going on up here, on the surface. I used to laugh at Her flat mate, who out-talked all her depression; she would never let the other person have a word, as if she'd been afraid that she would hear the voice of her own conscience. what is it. that stain on our thought, the one we fight with the white hum, with the noise, throwing bullshit out through all possible canals. what is it, what is it now.
I don't seem to know.
I wasn't happy before either, so no, I don't think I'm lying to myself here and no, I don't blame myself – at least now people are within my reach, it's important, it's good and it's healthy. but I'm not able to be with my own thoughts, with myself, openly, overtly. instantly, I start looking for someone, whose voice would destroy this intimate quiet.

I met Her, sober, though it's hard to believe. so theatrical a meeting, twenty minutes in the heart of the city, at 2.30 a.m., Her wandering look and as usually all effort not to let the conversation get real, not to let honesty in. I kissed Her on her forehead, She kissed me back on my lips. and now silence again. She's the star of the sea, She'll decide herself when to surface again. I want to know She's safe.
I worry about people, I worry how I'm gonna manage and I moan way too much.


and inside that memento photograph there will always be a part of me. I know.