A rainy, cold Saturday in April.
On days like these I wear two cardigans—
English and Polish (a mother tongue
I have forsaken after two decades here),
worn the same way, they could work
if given another twenty years or so—
like freckles for Julianne Moore—
but it just so happens that I misplaced
my fountain pen somewhere along the way—
the typewritten letters simply don’t cut it.
But I might invest in personalised stationery
eventually.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
Every time I pass the red pillar box,
a peculiar fettle comes over me
(I wonder what went wrong; after all,
I’ve never been to Camden Town
or Botchergate in Carlisle)—
I’d like a cup of tea. The thing is,
I only drink herbal infusions—
not very British, if I may say so.
Who would have thought I’d break
over Earl Grey?
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
Caught in ungraceful ageing,
like the past imperfect
clinging to a collection of grainy photographs,
Mr Honk felt tangential
every time he was greeted by a neighbour
with the unfamiliar ‘Ay ay, fit like?’
or ‘Foos yer doos?’,
unable to muster the expected
‘Nae bad, chavin’ awa’ in response,
not because of the vernacular barrier
but for the simple fact that he’d answer the hum
of a foghorn or oystercatcher’s cry
rather than admitting that he longed for a touch
of unadulterated soma.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
… when playing mornings, how easy it is
to confuse a tuning fork with a piano
or Die Zwitscher-Maschine drawing silence.
Mr Honk’s hand hesitated for a moment
as he put a period after the closing sentence
of the belated valedictory obituary
clacked out on one of the inherited typewriters—
he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was
a ninny with impostor syndrome,
like his maisonette that had everything
but the essential furniture.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
hidden pilcrow 