Tag: life

a black and white man looks at a black and white cityscape where colorful clouds are coming

The enemy of good

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

While life is still in technicolour, I like watching it in the sharper contrast of a black-and-white
motion picture. And so you can imagine my irritation when I see on the silver screen a pale, flat
palette of colours instead. Where does this strange trend come from, and why? There is a saying
where I come from that better is the enemy of good, which basically means if you start messing
with something that is already fine, you will ruin it. I cannot argue with that after seeing Scarlet
Street colourised. I just hope they never touch Nosferatu.

a man with books sits by a tombstone

All the things that make me

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

I am the resultant of all minor and major ailments, injuries, and diseases that have befallen me.
My life consists of all the books I have read or at least hoped to get my hands on, all the places
I have been or refused to go, every word spoken and left unsaid, and many more. But in the end,
nothing of this will reach a graveyard except the name and two random dates. I am an engraver
preparing my tombstone.

a man looks through the window at the rain

A spoonful of breadcrumbs

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski3 Comments

For Stacey

A sudden rain washed the life out of a tree outside my window and stopped as soon as it started
mocking the rainbow. Separated by thick glass, I thought that even if I had no inclination to spit
from a height into the dirty current in the street, unable to reflect any of the ephemeral colours,
I would go rafting to mourn the will-o’-the-wisp and all my fallen brethren, weakened by a lack
of viands, only to discover that a spoonful of breadcrumbs from a percipient baker can nourish
better than a whole cake.

middle-aged man sleeping on a chair in the garden

The chill of my age

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

With my mouth open, I doze in a garden chair, trying to warm my bones
in the Sunday morning sun. Is this the first sign of ageing—the chilling
fact that I am freezing in August? I know that this is the north of Scotland,
but still. And with all due respect, I am only slowly approaching my fifties,
not my nineties. I am nothing like all the elderly folks passing by my place
on the way to the nearby church. To be honest, they somehow seem more
alive.

a figure in a pink jacket on the edge of a swimming pool

The background figures

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

In moments of distress, I find myself asking trivial questions, answers to which I can simply
disregard without any harm, so stop holding me accountable for every forgotten conversation
on some twopenny-halfpenny matters you deem important by the mere fact of your presence,
because if life happens to be the last sentiment I like to pursue, I would rather be the swimmer
from the Portrait of an Artist, an incidental faceless body still more alive than the pink jacket
at the edge of the pool—that quite handsome foreground hero, yet known only by association.
And although a lost cause, you could at least appreciate that there is an irresistible charm
to bystanders—the background figures of the elevated posture.

the poet sits on a hill and writes a poem

The poet’s choice of colours

Published on by Maciej Modzelewski1 Comment

I am a poet, a born grandstander, trained in the pageantry
of baring the soul. And don’t be fooled; the events of my life
might be the raw material, but it takes a great deal of fancy
to spill out a verse. Although, remember, even a stage death
requires the true colour of blood.