Can You Imagine - by Artur Międzyrzecki

CAN YOU IMAGINE

- by Artur Międzyrzecki (1922- 1996)

Absence
Can you imagine
Absence

Not as the the opposite
Of something that is
and breathes

Or a gap
in the universal
presence of things

Or a catchword
that calls for symbol's mediation
Or for dialectic quibbles

But as infinite
transparence
When no images

take root
A colourless
invisible monochromy

Absence
Something that's
not there

That's
not there
anymore.

* * *

- translated from the Polish of Artur Międzyrzecki by Stanislaw Baranczak & and Clare Cavanagh