A lifelong cinephile,
I no longer watch films—
I’m perfectly content
with trailers.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
Tag: irony
Perfectly forgettable
I recently got new neighbours.
After the energetic magpie family moved out,
the tree outside my window was quiet for a while.
Now a pair of pigeons has appeared—
though not high up in the tree like the magpies,
but on a branch right next to my window—
yet they’re barely noticeable, without fuss
taking shifts in performing
their incubation duties.
Even their cooing is a rare occurrence.
They are perfectly forgettable
breeding machines
some call a symbol of love.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
The revelation of a dim mind
I have always believed that boredom is a symptom of the laziness of the mind, for brilliant minds are self-sufficient, as seen in the case of Richard Feynman, who remained lucid, mentally active, and undisturbed even by the absence of sensory input in John C. Lilly’s isolation tank. And although I’m far from that level of acumen myself, I’ve often quipped that I’m never bored because I share my time with a very intelligent person—myself. Besides, I tend to keep books close at hand. (And speaking of books and great minds, I’ve long found it fascinating when intellectuals claim that a particular book changed their life—only to then have a flash of insight: nothing like that has ever happened to me, so either I’m not easily impressed, or I’m simply too dim to grasp what I read.)
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
The legacy
qui dolorem ipsum, quia dolor sit
De finibus bonorum et malorum, Marcus Tullius Cicero
How can I not pity
the old beggar Cicero
for his most read text
being Lorem ipsum?
But I guess that suffices
for an indifficile reader
content with the life
of a tourist—myself.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
Rien que des plumes
With a vague idea of the age of winnocence,
Mr Honk stumbled upon the most delightful insult:
strange creatures with a few feathers
where brains should be—and it only took it a century
to reach his bookshelf.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
The childhood gaieties
There is nothing like father-son bonding
over car washing on Saturday afternoon—
even if rendered futile by the torrential rain—
on the long list of childhood gaieties we’ll try
to forget for the rest of our lives.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
Mon Dieu!
With every line a liability—
and Ea von Allesch out of reach—
I can’t leave my expectations
at the mercy of the em dash.
And while I can always hang a thousand words
celebrating the forlornly sought-after mortality
of Death itself
on the wall,
there’s no need to be overly dramatic—
everyone deserves a postmortem, after all,
even the slightly hysterical.
Isn’t that what a pied-à-terre is for?
Perhaps.
Unless you make it your living
room.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
Large numbers
Will I ever be able to live
up to my autobiography?
The last time I tried, it ended
in a rather embarrassing entanglement
that continues to suck my soul
and wallet dry. But that’s to be expected.
At some point, we all have to deal
with a few surprisingly large numbers,
whether it’s a jackpot, a brief’s tab,
or a boneyard plot digit.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
A walk of relief
When you find yourself vis-à-vis with the routine
horrors-turned-tattle, a walk down St Fittick’s might help,
even if the beheaded watcher’s house no longer guards
the graves from resurrectionists and unsolicited graffiti,
and you face either the leper squint or the rusting corpse
of a tanker abandoned in Nigg Bay. ‘But will it help?’
And how should I know? I’m only the poet.
More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com
hidden pilcrow 