By: Tadeusz Rozewicz
My little son enters
the room and says
'you are a vulture
I am a mouse'
I put away my book
wings and claws
grow out of me
their ominous shadows
race on the walls
I am a vulture
he is a mouse
'you are a wolf
I am a goat'
I walked around the table
and am a wolf
windowpanes gleam
like fangs
in the dark
while he runs to his mother
safe
his head hidden in the warmth of her dress
Second Poem
Name of Poem: Proofs
Death will not correct
a single line of verse
she is no proof-reader
she is no sympathetic
lady editor
a bad metaphor is immortal
a shoddy poet who has died
is a shoddy dead poet
a bore bores after death
a fool keeps up his foolish chatter
from beyond the grave
Third Poem
Name of Poem The Survivor
forth Poem
They mutilate they torment each other
with silences with words
as if they had another
life to live
they do so
as if they had forgotten
that their bodies
are inclined to death
that the insides of men
easily break down
ruthless with each other
they are weaker
than plants and animals
they can be killed by a word
by a smile by a look
I am twenty-four
led to slaughter
I survived.The following are empty synonyms:
man and beast
love and hate
friend and foe
darkness and light.The way of killing men and beasts is the same
I've seen it:
truckfuls of chopped-up men
who will not be saved.Ideas are mere words:
virtue and crime
truth and lies
beauty and ugliness
courage and cowardice.Virtue and crime weigh the same
I've seen it:
in a man who was both
criminal and virtuous.I seek a teacher and a master
may he restore my sight hearing and speech
may he again name objects and ideas
may he separate darkness from light.I am twenty-four
led to slaughter
I survived.
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