by Anna Kamieńska

“Look,” mother says in my dream,
“Look, a bird soars up to the clouds.
Why don’t you write about it,
How heavy it is, how swift?

“And here on the table—the smell
Of bread, a tinkling of plates.
You don’t need to speak of me again.
There is no me where I rest.

“I’ve passed, I’ve ceased,
It’s enough for me: goodnight!”
So I write this poem about birds,
About bread … Mama. Mama.

—

Originally from Goodbye to my Mother (1959), taken from Astonishments - selected Poems of Anna Kamieńska (translated from the Polish by Grażyna Drabik and David Curzon)