Category: English poetry

A surreal watercolour painting showing a man having breakfast

A bland diet for now

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

I’ve watched very many films—very bad ones—for a single line only,
and I’m gradually realising how these one-liners pave my sense of artificiality.
But I’ll be all right, I guess. It’s not like we stop making dinners
just because we burn our fingers once or twice.
For now, though, I think I’ll stick to silent cinema.
Who knows, maybe it will be like those avocado sandwiches
and chamomile tea that you first eat to soothe an upset stomach,
but after a while, they simply become your regular breakfast.

The Flammarion engraving is a wood engraving by an unknown artist that first appeared in Camille Flammarion's L'Atmosphère: Météorologie populaire (1888). The image depicts a man crawling under the edge of the sky, depicted as if it were a solid hemisphere, to look at the mysterious Empyrean beyond.

Random thoughts swirling through the poet’s mind after waking up

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

For millennia, people thought
that the sun revolved around the earth,
and it took a great deal of ingenuity,
pursued by burning at the stake,
to mentally set foot on the former,
or rather beyond both celestial bodies.
And yet we still have ardent flat-earthers among us.

After only a few miles on the bike,
a well-oxygenated brain may absorb a fair dose
of Wittgenstein or decide to leave the typical nine-to-five
for something more exotic, like a snake milker,
a ravenmaster, or a professional mourner.
If you are particularly lucky, you might even land your dream job
as an eternal employee, although that would require moving
to Gothenburg in Sweden.

My father used to say, ‘Ordnung muss sein,’
so that I would know that bending over a stool
and counting aloud the blows with his army belt
was for my future good;
otherwise, I could mistake it for an act of cruelty.
I wonder what his views would be
if he lived to see today, when even a light smack
is a criminal offence.

A surreal watercolor painting showing a half-angelic figure flying out of a room in the clouds and a man with a hat sitting thoughtfully on a stool

French breakfasts

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

You know it’s time to leave when every breakfast becomes an act
of desperation, and yet you prolong this little la-la land in denial
as if a stuffed croissant with café au lait were the epitome of certainty.

Didn’t you admit long ago that someone else had already spared you
from the hell of paradise? Knowing you, I doubt you have any desire
to answer. If anything, you’d pretend there was no question asked.

And there is still the unrewarding experience of returning home,
which sounds a bit melodramatic, even for someone like you,
but if you wanted to, it could simply be reduced to a logistics problem.

After all, a broken heart can’t find solace in complaining about cold feet.

A photograph of the New York City skyline with the Brooklyn Bridge in the foreground during a fireworks display

The magic of the big city

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

Why do New York, Paris, or Tokyo
sound so much better than Aberdeen?

Maybe because they are easier to pronounce
since they have two syllables
as opposed to three in the latter.

Or perhaps I’m just an insecure snob straight from the boonies
who can’t appreciate the cosiness of Granite City.
But I actually like the greyness of granite—it’s soothing—so it can’t be that.
And Aberdeen is still quite big compared to Stonehaven,
let alone Cookney.

Then what is so special about the first three?

First of all, they are not places—they’re ideas,
each with its own altar and apostles,
not to mention extensive iconography.

The power of large numbers could also play a role here.
After all, there are just way more opportunities over there.
You can’t argue with that.

And there is also a desire to belong
that is inherently at odds with that selfish individualism of ours.
What’s simpler than convincing ourselves
that, in such a magical place, we will be part of something bigger
while still minding our own business?

Surreal watercolor painting showing a sad man sitting with a cup of coffee on a bench under giant flowers

The happiest person

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

You are allowed to be happy.
I got this from a film, since, strangely enough, no one ever told me that.
I guess everyone assumes it’s a given, like being infatuated with actresses
(I’m somewhere between the Tilda Swinton and Charlotte Gainsbourg phases).
But this whole idea seems a bit sketchy—bedridden, if I may say so.
I have long suspected that of all the things that make up
our meticulous, hand-woven everyday lives, nothing matters more to us
than the pursuit of happiness, and yet all we get are bus tickets,
bank statements, cartes du jour, bills supposedly paid on time, detailed itineraries,
and the like. Is that why the happiest person I’ve ever known
was a diener?

Pencil sketch showing a man in pyjamas writing in bed

One last reflection before the shower

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

If I were to play a word association game,
the first thing that comes to mind
when love is mentioned would be films.

I don’t know how well it describes love,
but it certainly says quite a bit about me,
especially since I’m writing this at 1 a.m.,
after a day spent in my pyjamas
watching ‘Une nouvelle amie’ and ‘A Single Man’

on loop.

A surreal watercolor painting showing a man with a suitcase walking on the beach

The morning glory

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski3 Comments

They call it the morning glory, but what’s glorious about it?
If anything, it’s just an inconvenience, like phantom pain
after you left. I guess, as with everything in life, that too
will go away with time, and, whilst drear, it might even feel
cathartic to finally find something beyond this dangling
personal pronoun of mine.