Krystyna Lenkowska
Has published nine volumes of poetry three of which have appeared in bilingual Polish-English editions: Keep off the Primroses, 1999, Eve’s Choice, 2005 and An Overdue Letter to a Pimply Angel, 2014. Her poems, fragments of prose, translations, essays, literary notes and interviews have been published in numerous journals and anthologies in Poland (Fraza, Odra, Topos, Twórczość, Zeszyty Literackie), the USA (Absinthe, Boulevard, Chelsea, Confrontation, The Normal School, Spoon River Poetry Review), Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Macedonia, Mongolia, India, Romania and Ukraine. Her poem “The Eye of John Keats in Rome” won the first prize at the Sarajevo international poetry competition “Seeking for a Poem” in 2012. In 2013, at the DITET E NAIMIT Poetry Festival (Macedonia-Albania), she received the MENADA Prize for the special creativity. Lenkowska is a member of the Association of Polish Writers (SPP).
TRANSLATON INTO ENGLISH: EWA HRYNIEWICZ-YARBROUGH / USA
* * *
This day and night come
when we sit down to wine which has matured
between steppes
in the vats of stagnant time
we dip our lips and fingers
as if we plunged in it whole
and bite after bite
draught after draught
we share this bread this wormwood
somewhere between steppes
until blue absinthe covers the table to the horizon
as if our last vat had cracked
and your eyes came to me free
and were the steppe.
In the Color of the Hollyhock – Chopin’s Waltz
He played
a waltz then meadow and air
she soared above the bittersweet grass above a sonata
and above a prelude
as if she hadn’t yet lived in her body
she said and invited him to her place
tomorrow afternoon
Mon Dieu!
she smokes a cigar wears pants
(is she a woman?) hats like flambeaux
her white-red costume
it’s rumored the blood of a Polish king runs in her veins
and she used to dance mazurkas polonaises
my God!
before long
he’ll move his fashionable grand piano to her place
she writes smart books each day after supper this new mother
like a pharaoh’s wife
she calls him her genius and her weakling
her children keep guard at the bedroom door hoping
he’ll die
on Majorca
he’s rasping and dying
the clamminess in his fingers and the monotonous
chords of rain are killing him
he fears death and compassion
the island doctors say he’ll die soon or
has died already
in Paris
salons await him
a dandy he puts on a gilet the color of hollyhock and gloves
like buckwheat white as snow
a crimson storm surges in his chest
its sparks will ignite everything
into a perfect fire
he coughs
and spits blood
behind his breastbone Polish homesickness
sleepless like cosmic dawn
she’s so terribly alive and beautiful
all around kings of life drink gobble have fun after them flood
and fire
far away there
he dreamed of light
and of the sky rising over a birch wood in pure fifths
and octaves
here beamed ceilings like tree limbs fall into hellish triads
who’s that?
play sonny don’t spare any sounds
don’t stop.
Translated by Ewa Hryniewicz-Yarbrough and Teresa Cedar
The Eye of John Keats in Rome
For hours it stands in the window
once in a while it casts itself onto the Spanish Steps
or into the Tiber
on the steps
it bursts and then like a gel medusa
returns intact into the dark-skinned palm of a street vendor
in the water
it swims and then flies to dry its wings
it sweeps the Hadrian arches of the bridges
the sky of the Vatican domes
the horizons’ caravans of pines
in the evening it orders the same wine
in the same bar
at last it returns to the window and writes on the pane with its finger
the crowds on the steps won’t let it sleep
it doesn’t know what to do next
so it starts all over
from the pupil
from the core.
***
(...) death is a simple thing
K. I. Galczynski
Death is simple as a cradle
both are miracles of loss and gain
in the perfectly perfected present tense
is – isn’t
isn’t – is
there’s material evidence
beyond all doubt.
Obituary for Wisława Szymborska
After a life duly bearable and unbearable
With her separateness concealed like the Nobel medal
In her drawer
Wisława Szymborska died
In her bed
In her sleep
On a bitterly cold night
She didn\'t like to bother anyone
And quietly disappeared the way
One slips out to pick up matches at a newspaper kiosk
While others are having the time of their lives
So in such frigid weather
Let the others remain under down comforters while she finishes
Dreaming herself to the very end
In perfected silence
Where a moment
Is crystal clear and in the morning particles of gold
Fall from the sun so lightly
They elude the law of
Everything.
Translated by Ewa Hryniewicz-Yarbrough and Teresa Cedar
English 
Spanish
