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I cannot speak for more than an hour exclusively about poetry. At that point, life itself takes over again.
Wislawa Szymborska
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Wislawa Szymborska
Age: 88 †
Born: 1923
Born: July 2
Died: 2012
Died: February 1
Critic
Essayist
Literary Critic
Mechanic
Poet
Translator
Writer
Kornik
Maria Wisława Anna Szymborska
Szymborska
Hour
Poetry
Takes
Hours
Point
Speak
Cannot
Life
Exclusively
More quotes by Wislawa Szymborska
When I mention somebody, that doesn't necessarily mean that I identify with him, personally or poetically. I'm extremely happy when I encounter poets who are different than I am. The ones who have their own distinct poetics provide me with the greatest experiences.
Wislawa Szymborska
Generally speaking, life is so rich and full of variety you have to remember all the time that there is a comical side to everything.
Wislawa Szymborska
History counts its skeletons in round numbers. A thousand and one remains a thousand, as though the one had never existed: an imaginary embryo, an empty cradle, ... emptiness running down steps toward the garden, nobody's place in line.
Wislawa Szymborska
I slide my arm from under the sleeper's head and it is numb, full of swarming pins, on the tip of each, waiting to be counted, the fallen angels sit.
Wislawa Szymborska
Today when two people decide upon a thoughtless and precipitate abbreviation of the physical space between them, they think, at least at that moment, that they're mutually attracted and drawn together by an overwhelming force.
Wislawa Szymborska
I'm one-time-only to the marrow of my bones.
Wislawa Szymborska
Four billion people on this earth, but my imagination is still the same. It's bad with large numbers. It's still taken by particularity. It flits in the dark like a flashlight, illuminating only random faces while all the rest go blindly by, never coming to mind and never really missed. . . . I can't tell you how much I pass over in silence.
Wislawa Szymborska
No one feels good at four in the morning. If ants feel good at four in the morning —three cheers for the ants.
Wislawa Szymborska
I am who I am. A coincidence no less unthinkable than any other.
Wislawa Szymborska
I started earning a living as a poet rather early on.
Wislawa Szymborska
What does the world get from two people/who exist in a world of their own?
Wislawa Szymborska
Any knowledge that doesn't lead to new questions quickly dies out: it fails to maintain the temperature required for sustaining life.
Wislawa Szymborska
Animals don't even try to look any different from what nature intended. They humbly wear their shells, scales, spines, plumes, pelts, and down. ... The conscious impulse to change one's appearance is found only among humans.
Wislawa Szymborska
Poorly prepared for the dignity of life, I barely keep up with the pace of the action imposed. Reality demands.
Wislawa Szymborska
The joy of writing. The power of preserving. Revenge of a mortal hand.
Wislawa Szymborska
When it comes, you’ll be dreaming that you don’t need to breathe that breathless silence is the music of the dark and it’s part of the rhythm to vanish like a spark.
Wislawa Szymborska
And whatever I do will become forever what I've done.
Wislawa Szymborska
Their faith will make it easier for them to live and die.
Wislawa Szymborska
Poetic talent doesn't operate in a vacuum. There is a spirit of Polish poetry.
Wislawa Szymborska
They say the first love's most important. That's very romantic, but not my experience.
Wislawa Szymborska
