Death of a Poet – August 4, 1944

Death of a Poet

August 4, 1944

For Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński, Poet, Polish Resistance Fighter, Romantic
on the 68th anniversary of his death during the Warsaw Uprising of 1944.

Take out my eyes, surgically or with a small spoon
For the hollowness of men’s hearts will overflow soon
A frightened rabbit in the forest of dark wolf resolve
When will we finally cease our madness and evolve?

When you dig my grave, do so quickly, and save some black earth –
…to shove into my mouth, to kill the spoken word birth
To shut me up and my strange ideals to abort
Rip from my mouth’s womb the fetus of a Christian sort

Be kind then to wipe the blood off the blades of fresh grass
On the long forgotten Polish meadows that have passed
Digging trenches in concrete, the future to ward off
A grenade in one hand, a poem with a dry cough

For I believe in a Fatherland without a name
And the saints who walk there, hand in hand with the Bright Dame
She alone knows our hearts are full of love, not dark rage
And can ask for His grace on us, release from sin’s cage

Harsh days fit for the Virgin Mary to carry us
As she carried the Christ Child… these ahead… they amass
And we all know the meaning of the hour is lost
In illusions spun of spider-silk, hope at what cost

Infernal maw, that opened wide at old Warsaw’s gate
Spilling forth diabolical men, machines of hate
Stirring rusted swords to come to life again and sing
Breath in lung, blood in heart, in the sky an eagle’s wing

A dwelling of the dead among us the living, now
To stand atop graves, to raise a fist to the sky, a brow
Furrowed with the worry of the past, future’s unknown
Seeds of doubt, fallen apples, we reap what we have sown

Look at me long – what am I, if not a lost feather
From the passing by wing of a white eagle, weather –
Changed, flags changed, against the backdrop of war, guns, flesh, blood
Here is the rubble beneath my feet, the footsteps of God

Here the last moment lingers without a name or face
Light of daylight meanders across the human race
Freedom of choice, a bullet flies across time and space
On the fourth day of that August, in a ruined place.

August 4, 2012