KRYSTYNA KONECKA

KRYSTYNA KONECKA

Save For Us

Unextinguished scar left by pine hurts in the thicket.

Spruce in mourning reverie, birch wearing a white coat

out of place although honest in premature greying

and holdup of fainted reeds on the departure route.

Spiritless regularity in the green homeland

in accordance to codex made by the creator.

It is a programme for me who from city’s poison

vapours broke through under the forest respirator.

There is a human being, too. Selection, industry and protection.

Sensible preferences - sentiments put aside.

Wasteland by the lake as well as a national park.

But if we stay and no deluge follows after us -

preserve for us, the sylvan God, at every turning

a moss-covered tree trunk with safe fern above the head.

TRANSLATED BY EWA SHERMAN, ENGLAND

Asking...

We are so capable to call fire by its name

in each language of the world. From the very first jolt

of lightning. From the tinder and flint. From the sweet flames

overcoming centuries of the cosmic darkness.

We can hold conversations with water that was taught

the linguistic cacophony of all continents.

Of trillions of cracked lips, invariably thirsty for

its life-giving power from heaven and from the depths.

By the fire and by the water noiselessly we

can pray to the air. Yearning identically in

metropolises, palaces, fields of hunger plots,

connected globally. And physiologically.

And nowadays - who will prompt us and in what language

just how to wield fire? Remaining water? And air?

TRANSLATED BY EWA SHERMAN, ENGLAND

02.02.2020

02,02 – 20,20

Hence the magic happened. Digital palindrome of

this date... Two minutes past two o’clock in the morning

I open the identical pattern - hourly.

We don't know what for the world and what for us is penned.

Eight zeros - eight twos. And the KON-figuration of

three hundred thirty-three days to the year’s finale

past thirty third day. Maybe without any drama

I will survive within the verses from dawn to dusk.

Perhaps numerologists will block trajectory

of the asteroid aiming towards the Earth today.

And we shall suddenly understand (really?) that we

are able to write world’s history with love and the sun.

And so - for eighteen hours and as many minutes.

And I break free from magic forever. For a while.

TRANSLATED BY EWA SHERMAN, ENGLAND

KRYSTYNA KONECKA

KRYSTYNA KONECKA is a poet, journalist and photographer. She lives in Poland (Bialystok). She has a MA degree in Polish Philology (Warsaw University) and she completed postgraduate studies of Culture and Education (Silesian University). She has been working in journalism and contributed articles to many magazines published in Warsaw. She has been working as photographer for a number of years and her numerous photographs have been published in magazines and presented at various exhibitions. Krystyna Konecka is a member of The Polish Writers’ Union (Warsaw branch). In poetry she favours sonnets. She is an author of nearly twenty books of poetry and reportages. Her poems have been published in Polish and foreign periodicals and anthologies. For her achievement’s poetry and journalism (reportages on social issues, literary and theatrical criticism, articles on the culture) Krystyna Konecka has received literary awards and was highly regarded by critics. She attends the international literary meetings.