Have you ever been let down
by a typewriter,
with its slugs tap-dancing
on a torn-out flyleaf,
or a fountain pen
preoccupied with the antepenult
in dissyllables?
And yet, you might still prefer that
to chalking doors.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
Sometimes I have the same dream over and over again,
as if a turntable needle were stuck in the groove of a broken record
that would otherwise be an uneventful night. It wakes me up eventually,
and more often than not, I cannot get back to sleep.
Since tossing and turning makes no more sense than getting out of bed,
I choose the latter, and, trying to avoid the usual squeaky floor concerto,
I walk over to my desk.
To prevent the neighbours’ wrath, I’d rather not touch the typewriter
and settle for my good old friend, the fountain pen—or I would
in the pre-digital era, but sitting in front of a computer screen
doesn’t sound as romantic.
You see, it is all about keeping up the appearance of an artistic vibe.
After all, we are all occasional imposters.
Somewhere between a punching bag’s punching bag
and a fully fledged piss-artist, you decided that life is not long enough
to carry on like that, but you also know that it’s nothing
but an act of pure cruelty if you constantly complain about it
and still decide to bring a new one into this wretched realm of yours.
Then you may recall the invisible you barely knew, and only briefly,
as your blooming youth denied him a single breath in your vicinity.
The problem is that he has long disappeared from your sight,
and you have no idea where to start to find him.
I can give you a clue: always look for the one with a book,
mastering the sigla of the Leiden Conventions or chasing the quiet of a meadow
enchanted in the vellum pages of the Voynich manuscript.
Once you find me, never let me go. We may have enough time
for one last vacat page to fill.
hidden pilcrow 