Saturday, April 2, 2022

JERZY FICOWSKI ~





Village Landscape



There is silence in the meadows

of former battlefields


the bank of the bug river arranges

shells and bones


at times a wasp's ricochet

shoots from the burdocks


someone was buried here

or somewhere else


and there is no hole in heaven

as there is on earth




.     .     .


I was unable to save

a single life


I couldn't sleep

a single bullet


so I circle cemeteries

that aren't there

I search for words

that aren't there

I run


to the aid uncalled for

to the rescue delayed


I want to get there on time

even if it's already over





Kazakhstan, USSR



they let us out of the wagons

right here


And nothing anywhere


not a river

to drown in


or a tree

to hang oneself



____________________________

Jerzy Ficowski

Everything I Don't Know

Selected Poems

translated from the Polish by

Jennifer Grotz & Piotr Sommer

World Poetry Books, 2021