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two ends

he won’t chance another ugly betty – she won’t be forgotten, 
while polite boys give battle-axes a miss – no one will kick him out of her.
he’s in gośka more than he was then, spreading faster than loosestrife. 
the beautiful joanna was easier, screamed thrice over, then wrapped 
herself in a piotr or a marek, fell silent. gośka can’t, torn apart she tosses

grenades his way: you warp my dreams, feed me thistles. then lick chocolate
off the wrists of princesses. funny, she comes to him in dreams nicely enough, 
sometimes a little too nicely – he fears that the most, wants to chase the uglies 
from his door, letting loose all his wolves and jackals. he misses the warmth
joanna used to give, was too easy to cross off, be pleased by a tomasz or a robert.

joanna dreamt someone had made her into a mad wench. come morning, 
she is longing for something.

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Summer, wild summer

The morning lined with felt and the patient work of red
thread – faith in justice and hope for reward.
Imagine the summer as the insides of a stalk, now
whimpering in the fire. Or as a fox’s paw print on the path
to the latrine. Yes, that is where I sought out my own
glade, but my hands kept hitting turf

or the shoots of wet ferns. I sometimes dream of that
camp, a morose resort in the lands of Lemkos, shady
pastures and stuffy, buzzing raspberry bushes. And then
silence, a form of thick formalin, which over the course
of months can suspend a scrap of flesh from a branch.

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Shortcomings

At first, tell tales, rant until it’s gibberish.
Time is a relative matter, look over your shoulder just in case.

Or look behind you. For why should you not age?
K picks a battered handbag off the asphalt, puts it down again.

K likes it when you kick your legs, swinging, carefree
(I only felt this way once, 21 VIII 2005).

Then the photos develop, aping our ancestors’ shamans.
Unashamed of shame, never angry at one’s own anger.

And dancing, though as a rule she tends not to.
And dancing, though as a rule she tends not to.

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Donor

the city needs my blood

between Bracka and Bankowa Streets marked ambulances
fog falling on provincial walls broken berliner is almost next door

the London variety falling on Jack the Ripper
he’s from round here Silesian vampire with a hammer

over me a low from Scandinavia
Jesus what kitsch reindeer blue post-ice-age lakes by numbers

I stumble on the remains of my own blood
take my body and the blood divide amongst yourselves

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Writing

Write on. A cold writing.
Unutterably pale and desiccate.
Like a less than friendly dream, lunacy’s confidant.

Write on into the future, which has no gender or soul.
Driving through ashes. Through the dusk it crosses
with horrendous features, eyes of no colour.

Where a river runs trembling through dead quills.

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on recalling

it is early evening camp fires, aniseed

particles on women’s lips. it is listening to

the whisper of motorways coated in a transparent

film of lights like the preparation of our epoch,

the chill of equalizers made by Diora, Radiotechnika,

Unitra. it was all that. boys

carrying the cobalt seas in their eyes and a spade,

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8 WIERSZY / POEMS

ruptures (medley)

and another line deprives access to the sea

we stand on the pier paralysed like all

those stories about a group of friends honouring

the final wish of one dead rolling through countries and bars

cross crossroads with the promise of ashes scattered along the coast

but once there can’t do anything other than turn circles

wandering is an aim in itself (when setting off on a

journey choose the furthest route) something constantly

piercing through out of the background like a wave function

explicitly describing the edges of body

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5 new poems

*

We live a stone’s throw from the west. Like in the movies, whatever the change is.
The sky changes colour: battered, unbeaten, its green turning violet
yellow bile all over us. A plane cuts the screen at a prearranged point:

women and children with their faces on the floor, men returning years later.
They hold bottles filled with petrol, their heads high. Even, but without vocals.
They mistake hunger for desire, transparent they spit pips from the most recent spring.

The count off does not end before sunrise. Illnesses put out into the corridor.
As long as you remember to touch, wash your hands. Extinguish your heart in rusty water.
You will dream of christenings, I’ll dream of a gold tooth. Sand will fill the swellings.

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