Eternal Enemies Poems

by Zagajewski, Adam; Cavanagh, Clare

• ISBN13: 9780374216344
• ISBN10: 0374216347
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-03-18
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Summary

The highway became the Red Sea. We moved through the storm like a sheer valley. You drove; I looked at you with love. from "Storm" One of the most gifted and readable poets of his time, Adam Zagajewski is proving to be a contemporary classic. Few writers in either poetry or prose can be said to have attained the lucid intelligence and limpid economy of style that have become a matter of course with Zagajewski. It is these qualities, combined with his wry humor, gentle skepticism, and perpetual sense of history's dark possibilities, that have earned him a devoted international following. This collection, gracefully translated by Clare Cavanagh, finds the poet reflecting on place, language, and history. Especially moving here are his tributes to writers, friends known in person or in bookspeople such as Milosz and Sebald, Brodsky and Blakewhich intermingle naturally with portraits of family members and loved ones.Eternal Enemiesis a luminous meeting of art and everyday life.

Author Biography

Adam Zagajewski was born in Lvov in 1945. His previous books include Tremor; Canvas; Mysticism for Beginners; Without End; Solidarity, Solitude; Two Cities; Another Beauty; and A Defense of Ardor—all published by FSG. He lives in Paris and Houston.

Table of Contents

Star	p. 3
En Route	p. 4
Music in the Car	p. 8
The Swallows of Auschwitz	p. 9
Stolarska Street	p. 10
Genealogy	p. 12
Karmelicka Street	p. 14
Long Street	p. 15
Tadeusz Kantor	p. 17
The Power Cinema	p. 19
The Church of Corpus Christi	p. 21
Was It	p. 22
Rainbow	p. 23
Friends	p. 25
Sicily	p. 26
Describing Paintings	p. 27
Blizzard	p. 28
Poetry Searches for Radiance	p. 29
The Diction Teacher Retires from the Theater School	p. 33
In a Little Apartment	p. 34
The Orthodox Liturgy	p. 35
Rome, Open City	p. 36
The Sea	p. 38
Reading Milosz	p. 40
Walk Through This Town	p. 41
Ordinary Life	p. 43
Music Heard with You	p. 44
At the Cathedral's Foot	p. 46
Impossible Friendships	p. 47
Rain Drop	p. 48
Butterflies	p. 49
In a Strange City	p. 51
Camogli	p. 52
Bogliasco: The Church Square	p. 53
Staglieno	p. 54
Two-Headed Boy	p. 55
Our World	p. 56
Small Objects	p. 57
Defending Poetry, Etc	p. 58
Subject: Brodsky	p. 59
Self-Portrait, Not Without Doubts	p. 61
Conversation	p. 63
Old Marx	p. 65
To the Shade of Aleksander Wat	p. 67
Night Is a Cistern	p. 68
Storm	p. 69
Evening, Stary Sacz	p. 70
Blake	p. 71
Notes from a Trip to Famous Excavations	p. 72
Zurbaran	p. 74
Noto	p. 75
Traveling by Train Along the Hudson	p. 79
The Greeks	p. 80
Great Ships	p. 81
Erinna of Telos	p. 83
Of Kingdoms	p. 84
Syracuse	p. 85
Submerged City	p. 86
Epithalamium	p. 88
Gate	p. 90
New Year's Eve,2004	p. 91
No Childhood	p. 92
Music Heard	p. 93
Balance	p. 94
Morning	p. 95
Old Marx(2)	p. 97
Dolphins	p. 98
Organ Tuning	p. 100
Firemen's Helmets	p. 101
A Bird Sings in the Evening	p. 102
Wait for an Autumn Day	p. 103
Kathleen Ferrier	p. 105
Life Is Not a Dream	p. 107
It Depends	p. 109
America's Sun	p. 110
Antennas in the Rain	p. 111
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