My Aunts

1945 –

2021

Always caught up in what they called 
the practical side of life 
(theory was for Plato), 
up to their elbows in furniture, in bedding, 
in cupboards and kitchen gardens,
they never neglected the lavender sachets 
that turned a linen closet to a meadow.

The practical side of life, 
like the Moon's unlighted face, 
didn't lack for mysteries; 
when Christmastime drew near, 
life became pure praxis 
and resided temporarily in hallways, 
took refuge in suitcases and satchels.

And when somebody died--it happened 
even in our family, alas--
my aunts, preoccupied
with death's practical side, 
forgot at last about the lavender,
whose frantic scent bloomed selflessly 
beneath a heavy snow of sheets.
Don't just do something, sit there.
And so I have, so I have,
                    the seasons curling around me like smoke,
Gone to the end of the earth and back without sound.

Excerpted from Without End: New and Selected Poems by Adam Zagajewski. Translated by Clare Cavanaugh, Renata Gorczynski, Benjamin Ivry, and C. K. Williams. This poem is translated by Clare Cavanagh. Published by Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Copyright © 2002 by Adam Zagajewski. All rights reserved.

I watched the arctic landscape from above and thought of nothing, lovely nothing. I observed white canopies of clouds, vast expanses where no wolf tracks could be found. I thought about you and about the emptiness that can promise one thing only: plenitude— and that a certain sort of snowy wasteland bursts from a surfeit of happiness. As we drew closer to our landing, the vulnerable earth emerged among the clouds, comic gardens forgotten by their owners, pale grass plagued by winter and the wind. I put my book down and for an instant felt a perfect balance between waking and dreams.

Between the computer, a pencil, and a typewriter half my day passes. One day it will be half a century. I live in strange cities and sometimes talk with strangers about matters strange to me. I listen to music a lot: Bach, Mahler, Chopin, Shostakovich. I see three elements in music: weakness, power, and pain. The fourth has no name. I read poets, living and dead, who teach me tenacity, faith, and pride.

Poems

My Aunts

More by this poet

Balance

Self-Portrait

Poems

Page submenu block

My Aunts

More by this poet

Balance

Self-Portrait

Newsletter Sign Up