Wisława Szymborska Quotes

Dividing earth and skyis not the right wayto think about this wholeness.It only allows one to liveat a more precise address--were I to be searched forI'd be found much faster.My distinguishing marksare rapture and despair.From 'Sky', in the collection 'Miracle Fair
Wisława Szymborska
No one feels good at four in the morning.If ants feel good at four in the morning—three cheers for the ants.
Wisława Szymborska
I am telling himwhat he wants to hear: antsdying of love underthe constellation of the dandelion.I swear that a white rose,sprinkled with wine, sings.I am laughing, tiltingmy head carefullyas if checking an invention.I am dancing, dancingin astonished skin, inan embrace that creates me.
Wisława Szymborska
My apologies to chance for calling it necessity. My apologies to necessity if I'm mistaken, after all. Please, don't be angry, happiness, that I take you as my due.May my dead be patient with the way my memories fade. My apologies to time for all the world I overlook each second.
Wisława Szymborska
The world, whatever we might think about it terrified by its vastness and by our helplessness in the face of it, embittered by its indifference to individual suffering—of people, animals, and perhaps also plants, for how can we be sure that plants are free of suffering; whatever we might think about its spaces pierced by the radiation of stars, stars around which we now have begun to discover planets, already dead? still dead?—we don’t know; whatever we might think about this immense theater, to which we may have a ticket, but it is valid for a ridiculously brief time, limited by two decisive dates; whatever else we might think about this world—it is amazing.
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The buzzard has nothing to fault himself with.Scruples are alien to the black panther.Piranhas do not doubt the rightness of their actions.The rattlesnake approves of himself without reservations.The self-critical jackal does not exist.The locust, alligator, trichina, horseflylive as they live and are glad of it.The killer whale's heart weighs one hundred kilosbut in other respects it is light.There is nothing more animal-likethan a clear conscienceon the third planet of the Sun.
Wisława Szymborska
-A Word On Statistics-Out of every hundred people, those who always know better:fifty-two.Unsure of every step:almost all the rest. Ready to help,if it doesn't take long:forty-nine. Always good,because they cannot be otherwise:fourwell, maybe five. Able to admire without envy:eighteen. Led to errorby youth (which passes):sixty, plus or minus. Those not to be messed with:four-and-forty. Living in constant fearof someone or something:seventy-seven. Capable of happiness:twenty-some-odd at most. Harmless alone,turning savage in crowds:more than half, for sure. Cruelwhen forced by circumstances:it's better not to know,not even approximately. Wise in hindsight:not many morethan wise in foresight. Getting nothing out of life except things:thirty(though I would like to be wrong). Balled up in painand without a flashlight in the dark:eighty-three, sooner or later. Those who are just:quite a few, thirty-five. But if it takes effort to understand:three. Worthy of empathy:ninety-nine. Mortal:one hundred out of one hundreda figure that has never varied yet.
Wisława Szymborska
They're both convincedthat a sudden passion joined them.Such certainty is beautiful,but uncertainty is more beautiful still.Since they'd never met before, they're surethat there'd been nothing between them.But what's the word from the streets, staircases, hallways--perhaps they've passed by each other a million times?I want to ask themif they don't remember--a moment face to facein some revolving door?perhaps a "sorry" muttered in a crowd?a curt "wrong number" caught in the receiver?but I know the answer.No, they don't remember.They'd be amazed to hearthat Chance has been toying with themnow for years.Not quite ready yetto become their Destiny,it pushed them close, drove them apart,it barred their path,stifling a laugh,and then leaped aside.There were signs and signals,even if they couldn't read them yet.Perhaps three years agoor just last Tuesdaya certain leaf flutteredfrom one shoulder to another?Something was dropped and then picked up.Who knows, maybe the ball that vanishedinto childhood's thicket?There were doorknobs and doorbellswhere one touch had covered another beforehand.Suitcases checked and standing side by side.One night, perhaps, the same dream,grown hazy by morning.Every beginningis only a sequel, after all,and the book of eventsis always open halfway through.
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a stone / which in its own archaic, simpleminded way / sees life as a chain of failed attempts.
Wisława Szymborska
I am who I am.A coincidence no less unthinkablethan any other.I could have had differentancestors, after all.I could have flutteredfrom another nestor crawled bescaledfrom under another tree.Nature's wardrobeholds a fair supply of costumes:spider, seagull, field mouse.Each fits perfectly right offand is dutifully worninto shreds.
Wisława Szymborska
Memories come to mind like excavated statuesthat have misplaced their heads.
Wisława Szymborska
My choices are rejections, since there is no other way,but what I reject is more numerous,denser, more demanding than before.A little poem, a sigh, at the cost of indescribable loss.
Wisława Szymborska
When I pronounce the word Future,the first syllable already belongs to the past.When I pronounce the word Silence,I destroy it.
Wisława Szymborska
We live longerbut less preciselyand in shorter sentences.
Wisława Szymborska
The killer whale's heart weighs one hundred kilosbut in other respects it is light.There is nothing more animal-likethan a clear conscienceon the third planet of the Sun.
Wisława Szymborska
Loveless work, boring work, work valued only because others haven't got even that much, however loveless and boring--this is one of the harshest human miseries.
Wisława Szymborska
We have a soul at times.No one’s got it non-stop,for keeps.Day after day,year after yearmay pass without it.Sometimesit will settle for awhileonly in childhood’s fears and raptures.Sometimes only in astonishmentthat we are old.It rarely lends a handin uphill tasks,like moving furniture,or lifting luggage,or going miles in shoes that pinch.It usually steps outwhenever meat needs choppingor forms have to be filled.For every thousand conversationsit 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 advantageand creaky machinations make it sick.Joy and sorrowaren’t two different feelings for it.It attends usonly when the two are joined.We can count on itwhen we’re sure of nothingand curious about everything.Among the material objectsit favors clocks with pendulumsand mirrors, which keep on workingeven when no one is looking.It won’t say where it comes fromor when it’s taking off again,though it’s clearly expecting such questions.We need itbut apparentlyit needs usfor some reason too.
Wisława Szymborska
I'm old-fashioned and think that reading books is the most glorious pastime that humankind has yet devised.
Wisława Szymborska
The joy of writing.The power of preserving.Revenge of a mortal hand.
Wisława Szymborska
Four billion people on this earthbut my imagination is still the same.It's bad with large numbers.It's still taken by particularity.It flits in the dark like a flashlight,illuminating only random faceswhile all the rest go by,never coming to mind and never really missed.
Wisława Szymborska
A Note Life is the only way to get covered in leaves, catch your breath on the sand, rise on wings; to be a dog, or stroke its warm fur; to tell pain from everything it's not; to squeeze inside events, dawdle in views, to seek the least of all possible mistakes. An extraordinary chance to remember for a moment a conversation held with the lamp switched off; and if only once to stumble upon a stone, end up soaked in one downpour or another, mislay your keys in the grass; and to follow a spark on the wind with your eyes; and to keep on not knowing something important.
Wisława Szymborska
When it comes, you’ll be dreamingthat you don’t need to breathe;that breathless silence isthe music of the darkand it’s part of the rhythmto vanish like a spark.
Wisława Szymborska