so grey days

Autumn got so many amazing colors, but in the city very often there are just thousands shades of grey...

Speak softly: you’re older than the one

you were so long; you’re older
than yourself—and yet you still don’t know
what absence, poetry, and gold are.

Rusty water swept the street; a brief storm
shook this supine, sleepy city.
Each storm is a valediction, scores of photographers
seem to swirl above us, catching in a flash
our moments of panic and fear.

You know what mourning is, despair so fierce
It chokes the heart’s rhythm and the future.
You’ve cried among strangers, in a modern store,
where deft coins make the rounds.
.....
hold long talks with envoys from dry countries
and cracked lips, you must wait,
write letters, read books of five hundred pages.
Speak softly. Don’t give up on poetry. - A. Zagajewski