Weekly Watering Hole #1

Gather 'round and take a sip from the watering hole.

This week's serving is from Polish poet, Wislawa Szymborska, winner of the 1996 'Nobel Prize for Literature' whose poems have been translated across the globe.
Her writing is known for its "wit, irony, and deceptive simplicity."

----

A Few Words on the Soul

----

We have a soul at times.
No one's got it non-stop,
for keeps.

Day after day,
year after year
may pass without it.

Sometimes
it will settle for awhile
only in childhood's fears and raptures.
Sometimes only in astonishment
that we are old.

It rarely lends a hand
in uphill tasks,
like moving furniture,
or lifting luggage,
or going miles in shoes that pinch.

It usually steps out
whenever meat needs chopping
or forms have to be filled.

For every thousand conversations
it participates in one,
if even that,
since it prefers silence.

Just when our body goes from ache to pain,
it slips off-duty.

It's picky:
it doesn't like seeing us in crowds,
our hustling for a dubious advantage
and creaky machinations make it sick.

Joy and sorrow
aren't two different feelings for it.
It attends us
only when the two are joined.

We can count on it
when we're sure of nothing
and curious about everything.

Among the material objects
it favors clocks with pendulums
and mirrors, which keep on working
even when no one is looking.

It won't say where it comes from
or when it's taking off again,
though it's clearly expecting such questions.

We need it
but apparently
it needs us
for some reason too.

I just thought while reading this, 'I wonder would this win our weekly contest?' I'm not sure it would! Not that it's a bad poem or anything, it just shows how subjective poems can be. I often think it would be a fun experiment to have an award winning poem written on here and see would it get picked up and/or voted on by the members and judges :)

I haven't read much translated poetry but I reckon much of the soul of the poem has been lost in the translation. The sound and rhythm must be so difficult to re-create in a translation, let alone the subtle meanings and metaphors.

It still was a beautiful poem though, translated or not :)

I agree, Colm. I suppose the poet's goal was to build from unimpressive thoughts to more complex ones, but the first few stanzas seemed weak and like they could've been written by your average tween. Could be that presence was lost in translation, like you said.
I read some of her other poems and liked the darker ones, but didn't want to darken the mood in these weekly threads too early on.
Demonic Angel, I still appreciated the poem as well :)

Here's another:

----

On Death, Without Exaggeration

----

It can't take a joke,
find a star, make a bridge.
It knows nothing about weaving, mining, farming,
building ships, or baking cakes.
In our planning for tomorrow,
it has the final word,
which is always beside the point.

It can't even get the things done
that are part of its trade:
dig a grave,
make a coffin,
clean up after itself.

Preoccupied with killing,
it does the job awkwardly,
without system or skill.
As though each of us were its first kill.

Oh, it has its triumphs,
but look at its countless defeats,
missed blows,
and repeat attempts!

Sometimes it isn't strong enough
to swat a fly from the air.
Many are the caterpillars
that have outcrawled it.

All those bulbs, pods,
tentacles, fins, tracheae,
nuptial plumage, and winter fur
show that it has fallen behind
with its halfhearted work.

Ill will won't help
and even our lending a hand with wars and coups d'etat
is so far not enough.

Hearts beat inside eggs.
Babies' skeletons grow.
Seeds, hard at work, sprout their first tiny pair of leaves
and sometimes even tall trees fall away.

Whoever claims that it's omnipotent
is himself living proof
that it's not.

There's no life
that couldn't be immortal
if only for a moment.

Death
always arrives by that very moment too late.

In vain it tugs at the knob
of the invisible door.
As far as you've come
can't be undone.

Really enjoyed the depth in these two poems. Thanks for sharing this poet, Jane. I read something I've never read before which is always good.

Wow. I love the entire poem but this just sums it all up:

"Death always arrives by that very moment too late.
...
As far as you've come / can't be undone."

Yes, the essence of life is momentary immortality, just as the essence of youth is invulnerability. It takes age to first fear death and then to recognize you've already beat him.

Yes, those were the two lines that stuck with me as well. I like the second poem more :)