Photo by Natalia Trofimova on UnsplashFruit
If someone could do my breathing for me—some watchful guard, who’d
never doze off—I’d sleep in peace without end.
Unwoken by the birds singing in the branches of an old birch, which
belongs to me, or the other birds singing in the other trees, which belong
to no one.
Unwoken by the smells, the slender tongues of food and drink and the body
of my future husband.
Or the storm—the cinematic hand bringing death to the sparrows and the grasshoppers.
Watchful guard—before falling asleep I’d hang a hammer over your head—it would
keep its eye
on you.
Moulting
Dogs barking in the yard, it’s autumn
and the wind eases from warm
to cold
I’m waiting at the gate with my brother, our total age
is eleven,
do we still get the chance to imagine the dead
suddenly returning from this very darkness, and us sitting
together
to watch the launch of a Soviet missile?
We’re holding hands, our skins divided by moisture, remnants
of dog hair and unwashed dinner.
Under my nylon jacket, I feel an insect
entering, lost for a moment,
the flight response,
back then I don’t think it—I’m a child.
***
[Note: In the original Polish, "Fruit" appeared in the collection 'Traktaty Konstrata,' published by Biblioteka Kwartalnika Kulturalnego "Opcje"]
