Zbigniew Herbert
BEARS
Bears are divided into brown and white, also paws, head and
trunk. They have nice snouts, and small eyes. They like greedi-
ness very much. They don't want to go to school, but sleeping in
the forest — that, yes, very much. When they don't have any
honey, they clutch their heads in their hands and are so sad, so
sad, that I don't know. Children who love Winnie-the-Pooh
would give them anything, but a hunter walks in the forest and
aims with his rifle between that pair of small eyes.
CAT
He is all black, but has an electric tail. When he sleeps in the
sun he is the blackest thing one can imagine. Even in his sleep
he catches frightened mice. One can see this in the little claws
that are growing from his paws. He is terribly nice and naughty.
He picks birds off the trees before they are ripe.
COUNTRY
At the very corner of this old map is a country I long for. It is
the country of apples, hills, lazy rivers, sour wine, and love. Un-
fortunately a huge spider has spun its web over it, and with
sticky saliva has closed the toll gates of dreams.
It is always like that: an angel with a fiery sword, a spider,
and conscience.
THE WOLF AND THE SHEEP
— I've got you, said the wolf, and yawned. The sheep turned
its teary eyes toward him. — Do you have to eat me? It is really
necessary?
— Unfortunately I must. This is how it happens in all the
fables: Once upon a time a naughty sheep left its mother. In the
forest it met a bad wolf who. . .
— Excuse me, this is not a forest, but my owner's farm. I did
not leave my mother. I am an orphan. My mother was also eaten
by a wolf.
— It doesn't matter. After your death the authors of edifying
tales will look after you. They will add a background, motives,
and a oral. Don't hold it against me. You have no idea how silly
it is to be a bad wolf. Were it not for Aesop, we would sit on our
hind legs and gaze at the sunset. I like to do this very much.
Yes, yes dear children. The wolf ate the sheep, and then
licked his lips. Don't follow the wolf, dear children. Don't sac-
rifice yourselves for the moral.
FOREST
A path runs barefoot to the forest. Inside are many trees, a
cuckoo, Hansel and Gretel, and other small animals. But there
are no dwarfs, because they have left. When it gets dark and owl
closes the forest with a big key, for if a car sneaked in it would
really do a lot of harm.
WASP
When the honey, fruit and flowery tablecloth were whisked
from the table in one sweep, it flew off with a start. Entangled in
the suffocating smoke of the curtains, it buzzed for a long time.
At last it reached the window. It beat its weakening body repeat-
edly against the cold, solid air of the pane. In the last flutter of its
wings drowsed the faith that the body's unrest can awaken a
wind carrying us to longed-for worlds.
You who stood under the window of your beloved, who saw
your happiness in a shop window — do you know how to take
away the sting of this death?
THE POET'S HOUSE
Once there was breath on these window panes, the fragrance
of a roast, the same face in the mirror. Now it is a museum. The
flora of the floors has been exterminated, the chests emptied,
rooms flooded with wax. For entire days and nights they kept
the windows open. Mice avoid this infected house.
The bed is neatly made. But no one wants to spend even a
single night here.
Between his wardrobe, his bed and his table — the white
frontier of absence, precise as the cast of a hand.
_________________
Zbigniew Herbert
Elegy for the Departure
translated from the Polish by
John and Bogdana Carpenter
Ecco Press 1999
