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Astonishments: Selected Poems of Anna Kamienska
Anna Kamienska came of age during the horrors of the Nazi occupation of Poland and lived under Communism. These experiences, as well as the sudden death of her husband, led her to engagement with the Bible and the great religious thinkers of the twentieth century. Her poems record the struggles of a rational mind with religious faith, addressing loneliness and uncertainty in a remarkably direct, unsentimental manner. Her spiritual quest has resulted in extraordinary poems on Job, other biblical personalities, and victims of the Holocaust. Other poems explore the meaning of loss, grief, and human life. Still, her poetry expresses a fundamentally religious sense of gratitude for her own existence and that of other human beings, as well as for myriad creatures, such as hedgehogs, birds and "young leaves willing to open up to the sun."
144 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2007
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About the author
Anna Kamieńska
38 books44 followersPolish poet, writer, translator and literary critic who wrote many books for children and adolescents.
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November 3, 2024
I write in order to comprehend not to express myself
— Anna Kamieńska, "The Lamp"
Anna Kamieńska (1920-1986) was a Polish poet, writer, literary critic and translator who belonged to a remarkable generation of poets, including Tadeusz Rozewicz and Nobel laureate Wisława Szymborska, whose poetry I’ve recently read.
I became acquainted with Kamieńska by chance. I can’t remember what I was looking for—probably something unattainable—and came across a beautiful quote.
That first instant connection...
...led me to something a little larger than the entire universe.
A universe that contains the struggle between anything mundane and the spiritual plane, childhood memories, a world during the Nazi occupation, personal tragedies and metaphysical dilemmas that prompted an encounter with the Bible and have shaped her poetry unexpectedly. Her minimalist, direct, sharper-than-a-Japanese-knife poetry. I was pleasantly surprised: I found a poet capable of discussing the usual timeless themes in a delightful, straightforward manner.
There are no masks, no cryptic messages; only the right amount of simplicity and frankness to make those verses extraordinary. Naturally, I couldn't connect with the poems that have a more religious tone, and my inability to do so shouldn’t deter anyone from giving this collection a chance. In fact, I gave it five stars because I found it beautifully thought-provoking as it speaks of our fleeting, ever-changing existence; of loneliness, love, hope, futility, writing, faith, horror:
(Dr. Janusz Korczak (1878-1941) was the director of the Jewish Orphanage in Warsaw, he accompanied the children into the gas chamber at Treblinka. Even though he was offered an escape, he refused to abandon his children. In his memoir The Pianist, Władysław Szpilman wrote: “He wanted to ease things for them. He told the orphans they were going out into the country, so they ought to be cheerful.”)
something inconsolable:
something ironically amusing:
Astonishments is the first English translation and publication of Kamieńska’s work, which I believe is a fitting title. This edition also includes extracts from The Notebook (1635-1972) and (1973-1979), which is my favorite part of the book.
*
It definitely seems that way. But just as Kamieńska avoided the hell of unwritten poems, she encourages us to do the same with the hell of unsaid words.
June 25, 2021-Aug 29, 2021
* Later on my blog.
** Credits:
Photo 1
Photo 2
April 26, 2018
Stunning. The closest poetry has come to move me to tears. You get a great sense Kamieńska really was a poet in complete gratitude for being alive, writing amidst the firing squads and bombings of Nazi occupied Poland, but she expresses herself without the need for sentimentality, even softened by a touch of subversive humor. Her poems touch on the loss of Jewish and Yiddish culture from her homeland as a result of the Holocaust, as well as themes of grief, love, loneliness, and the spiritual life that found her following the death of her husband, having previously been a non believer. Some poems were relatively short, but all were intelligible, with a profound emotional depth.
What I admire the most is her honest clarity, told in a straightforward manner without any defensive masks. For all the darkness that surrounded her life, Kamieńska shines for the love of the world in true faith, her poetic sensibility sustains a sense of wonder that transcends
even the most common things. Out of the mist of the general and abstract, she draws out a specific object or a particular gesture making it glow in the light of our attention. Through life's tragedies and disappointments, her poetry has an obvious appreciation for the ordinary little pleasures of life, the things we sometimes take for granted.
'Astonishments' isn't without sadness though, adding a tragic dimension to the human condition, but it's handled in a humane way, from life's experiences, some of which we can relate to, some for obvious reasons we can't. In a generation rich with extraordinarily 20th century poets, Anna Kamieńska rightly belongs on any list. An astonishing work of beauty and power. My highlights - 'A Prayer That Will Be Answered', 'The Moment of Reconciliation', 'At the Border of Paradise', 'Things of This World', 'A Witness to Process', 'Cassandra at a Loss' and 'I was Standing' (below).
I was standing with my sister over
the patch of grave, and we were speaking
about some very important things.
The boy is doing better at school.
The youngest already chatters.
If you aren’t mean to people,
they’ll be good to you.
The apartment’s freshly painted.
We bought a table, chairs.
A neighbor stops by sometimes,
and says, ‘Your place looks nice.’
The plant that mother liked so much
is in bloom. I wanted to bring flowers
but was afraid they’d wilt.
The air, tree, stone and earth all listen
as we talk. And only the one for whom
we bring this news can’t hear.
But perhaps she stands behind us
and smiles at life’s affairs
And whispers, ‘I know, my darlings.
No need to tell me any more.’
Anna Kamieńska died in Warsaw, May 1986.
What I admire the most is her honest clarity, told in a straightforward manner without any defensive masks. For all the darkness that surrounded her life, Kamieńska shines for the love of the world in true faith, her poetic sensibility sustains a sense of wonder that transcends
even the most common things. Out of the mist of the general and abstract, she draws out a specific object or a particular gesture making it glow in the light of our attention. Through life's tragedies and disappointments, her poetry has an obvious appreciation for the ordinary little pleasures of life, the things we sometimes take for granted.
'Astonishments' isn't without sadness though, adding a tragic dimension to the human condition, but it's handled in a humane way, from life's experiences, some of which we can relate to, some for obvious reasons we can't. In a generation rich with extraordinarily 20th century poets, Anna Kamieńska rightly belongs on any list. An astonishing work of beauty and power. My highlights - 'A Prayer That Will Be Answered', 'The Moment of Reconciliation', 'At the Border of Paradise', 'Things of This World', 'A Witness to Process', 'Cassandra at a Loss' and 'I was Standing' (below).
I was standing with my sister over
the patch of grave, and we were speaking
about some very important things.
The boy is doing better at school.
The youngest already chatters.
If you aren’t mean to people,
they’ll be good to you.
The apartment’s freshly painted.
We bought a table, chairs.
A neighbor stops by sometimes,
and says, ‘Your place looks nice.’
The plant that mother liked so much
is in bloom. I wanted to bring flowers
but was afraid they’d wilt.
The air, tree, stone and earth all listen
as we talk. And only the one for whom
we bring this news can’t hear.
But perhaps she stands behind us
and smiles at life’s affairs
And whispers, ‘I know, my darlings.
No need to tell me any more.’
Anna Kamieńska died in Warsaw, May 1986.
May 26, 2016
Introduction, by Grażyna Drabik and David Curzon
--A Path in the Woods
Early Poems
from Goodnight to Mother (1959)
--The Mouths of Streets
--She Gets Up
--I Was Standing
--"Look," Mother Says
from In the Bird's Eye (1960)
--Futile
from Sources (1962)
--A Hand
from Impermanent Things (1963)
--[The time of harvest and the time of poems is passing]
from Revocation of Myth (1967)
--Grandparents
from Exile (1970)
--Anaximander Lands at the Shore of Exile and Founds the City of Sozopolis
--Angels
The White Manuscript (1970)
--[I was born]
--[Oh Anna Jan]
--[I don't know how a day flew by us]
--[All the photographs come flying]
--[Where do your dreams sleep now]
--[To be the earth]
The Second Happiness of Job et al.
from Herods (1972)
--A Leap
from The Second Happiness of Job (1974)
--The Return of Job
--The Silence of Job
--Job and a Woman
--The Departure of Job
--Late Summer
--Trees
--Grandma
--Gratitude
--Doctor Edith Stein
--The Other World
--Small Things
from The Manuscript Found in a Dream (1978)
--Cassandra at a Loss
--Doctor Korczak's Lie
--Names
--Dictionaries
--Summer
--Mothers
--The Just
--Bodies
--A Prayer That Will Be Answered
--Emmaus
--Conscience
--At the Border of Paradise
--The Moment of Reconciliation
--On a Sonnet by Leah Goldberg
--A Droplet of Blood
from Silences (1979)
--A Hedgehog
--Souls of Animals
--The Lamp
--The Washing of Feet
--Old Age
--Beautiful Hands Seen in a Tram
--Don't Worry
--A Pink Sweater
Late Poems
from In Mid-Word (1983)
--The Death of Simone
--The Empty Places
--In Mid-Word
from Two Darknesses (1984)
--A Talk with Mother
--Transformation
--Thirteen-Year-Old
--Annunciation
--Funny
--Thanks
--In a Hospital
--Elijah's Widow
--Things of This World
--Dying
--Lack of Faith
--Through the Body
--Hurry up
--Service
--Those Who Carry
--Into Solitude
from A New Name (1987)
--On the Threshold of the Poem
--Melancholy
--Classicism
--A Witness to Process
--Alter Ego
--A City Map
--Rembrandt
--The Weariness of the Prophet Elijah
from Silences and the Shortest Psalms (1988, posthumous)
--A Prayer
from Two Darknesses and Last Poems (1989, posthumous)
--As When in a Crowd
--Patience
--Difference
--Saint Martha
--Three Crosses
--On the Cross
--Extracts from The Notebook (1965-1972) and The Notebook (1973-1979)
Acknowledgments
--A Path in the Woods
Early Poems
from Goodnight to Mother (1959)
--The Mouths of Streets
--She Gets Up
--I Was Standing
--"Look," Mother Says
from In the Bird's Eye (1960)
--Futile
from Sources (1962)
--A Hand
from Impermanent Things (1963)
--[The time of harvest and the time of poems is passing]
from Revocation of Myth (1967)
--Grandparents
from Exile (1970)
--Anaximander Lands at the Shore of Exile and Founds the City of Sozopolis
--Angels
The White Manuscript (1970)
--[I was born]
--[Oh Anna Jan]
--[I don't know how a day flew by us]
--[All the photographs come flying]
--[Where do your dreams sleep now]
--[To be the earth]
The Second Happiness of Job et al.
from Herods (1972)
--A Leap
from The Second Happiness of Job (1974)
--The Return of Job
--The Silence of Job
--Job and a Woman
--The Departure of Job
--Late Summer
--Trees
--Grandma
--Gratitude
--Doctor Edith Stein
--The Other World
--Small Things
from The Manuscript Found in a Dream (1978)
--Cassandra at a Loss
--Doctor Korczak's Lie
--Names
--Dictionaries
--Summer
--Mothers
--The Just
--Bodies
--A Prayer That Will Be Answered
--Emmaus
--Conscience
--At the Border of Paradise
--The Moment of Reconciliation
--On a Sonnet by Leah Goldberg
--A Droplet of Blood
from Silences (1979)
--A Hedgehog
--Souls of Animals
--The Lamp
--The Washing of Feet
--Old Age
--Beautiful Hands Seen in a Tram
--Don't Worry
--A Pink Sweater
Late Poems
from In Mid-Word (1983)
--The Death of Simone
--The Empty Places
--In Mid-Word
from Two Darknesses (1984)
--A Talk with Mother
--Transformation
--Thirteen-Year-Old
--Annunciation
--Funny
--Thanks
--In a Hospital
--Elijah's Widow
--Things of This World
--Dying
--Lack of Faith
--Through the Body
--Hurry up
--Service
--Those Who Carry
--Into Solitude
from A New Name (1987)
--On the Threshold of the Poem
--Melancholy
--Classicism
--A Witness to Process
--Alter Ego
--A City Map
--Rembrandt
--The Weariness of the Prophet Elijah
from Silences and the Shortest Psalms (1988, posthumous)
--A Prayer
from Two Darknesses and Last Poems (1989, posthumous)
--As When in a Crowd
--Patience
--Difference
--Saint Martha
--Three Crosses
--On the Cross
--Extracts from The Notebook (1965-1972) and The Notebook (1973-1979)
Acknowledgments
October 15, 2014
“A poem has to be pinned to the world with something specific, something ugly. Life holds on to suffering. Otherwise, a poem would disappear, life would fly away.” — Anna Kamieńska, from a notebook, 1979
Polish poet Anna Kamieńska is well-acquainted with tragedy. She grew up during the Nazi occupation of Poland, lost her mother at a young age, and then her husband died unexpectedly. Amid this tragedy, she rediscovered Christianity. Her poems are simple and direct (and, being in translation, it is impossible for me to know if they’d read this simply in Polish) but appealing. She meditates on death, the life of Job, faith and doubt, and mundane daily interactions. Her poems are stark and beautiful, clear-eyed, somehow. Two short favorites:
“Lack of Faith”
Yes
even when I don’t believe
there is a place in me
inaccessible to unbelief
a patch of wild grace
a stubborn preserve
impenetrable
pain untouched sleeping in the body
music that builds its nest in silence
###
“Through the Body”
Our weaknesses are the way to God
Tell me why it is through the body
through torment of the body you speak to the spirit
why through leprosy fever deafness
You are a healer and not a priest
you take in your hands the head of the dying
from one lump you bring forth new life
like bread you multiply the body
You come through bodies not through sunsets
and the hard strong hand of blood and flesh
holds in the palm like a sparrow
the muscle of the human heart
###
Polish poet Anna Kamieńska is well-acquainted with tragedy. She grew up during the Nazi occupation of Poland, lost her mother at a young age, and then her husband died unexpectedly. Amid this tragedy, she rediscovered Christianity. Her poems are simple and direct (and, being in translation, it is impossible for me to know if they’d read this simply in Polish) but appealing. She meditates on death, the life of Job, faith and doubt, and mundane daily interactions. Her poems are stark and beautiful, clear-eyed, somehow. Two short favorites:
“Lack of Faith”
Yes
even when I don’t believe
there is a place in me
inaccessible to unbelief
a patch of wild grace
a stubborn preserve
impenetrable
pain untouched sleeping in the body
music that builds its nest in silence
###
“Through the Body”
Our weaknesses are the way to God
Tell me why it is through the body
through torment of the body you speak to the spirit
why through leprosy fever deafness
You are a healer and not a priest
you take in your hands the head of the dying
from one lump you bring forth new life
like bread you multiply the body
You come through bodies not through sunsets
and the hard strong hand of blood and flesh
holds in the palm like a sparrow
the muscle of the human heart
###
March 5, 2025
A wonderful collection. Now I plan to buy it and read it again with my pencil. For now, I’m keeping the library copy handy.
May 14, 2019
"The Empty Places"
Let us hurry to love people
Jan Twardowski
‘
I didn’t manage to love anyone
even though I hurried so much
It was as if I had to love only empty places
the dangling sleeves without the embrace
the beret abandoned by the head
the armchair that also should get up and leave the room
the books no longer touched
the comb with a silver hair left in it
the cots babies outgrew
the drawers full of unnecessary things
the pipe with a chewed mouthpiece
the shoes molded to the shape of a foot
that departed barefooted
the phone-receiver where voices grew hush
I hurried so much to love
and naturally I didn’t manage‘
Let us hurry to love people
Jan Twardowski
‘
I didn’t manage to love anyone
even though I hurried so much
It was as if I had to love only empty places
the dangling sleeves without the embrace
the beret abandoned by the head
the armchair that also should get up and leave the room
the books no longer touched
the comb with a silver hair left in it
the cots babies outgrew
the drawers full of unnecessary things
the pipe with a chewed mouthpiece
the shoes molded to the shape of a foot
that departed barefooted
the phone-receiver where voices grew hush
I hurried so much to love
and naturally I didn’t manage‘
April 30, 2010
This is the best collection of poems I have read in quite some time. They are tragically beautiful. They are heroic. Like a well spoken eulogy and damp eyes all around, everything you would hope a beautiful funeral should be this book is as poems.
Kamienska deals with spirituality and the meta-physical as someone who came to faith late in life, which sets a different tone from religious authors who were born into it. It carries a certain uniqueness that I've found lacking in other collections.
My personal favorites include "Doctor Korczak's Lie." I read it the first time, not fully grasping it's meaning, or even understanding what was meant by his lie until I got to the footnote, which reads, "Dr. Janusz Korczak (1878-1941) was the director of the Jewish Orphanage in Warsaw; he accompanied the children into the gas chamber at Treblinka." I went back and read it again and again.
My other favorites come from "The Second Happiness of Job," which are a collection of poems depicting Job's life after God allowed him to be tested.
Some lines:
"But happy Job didn't have the strength to be happy/ afraid he'd betray happiness by a second happiness/ afraid he'd betray life by a second life"
"You suffered through pain/ now suffer through happiness"
"does something exist there/ does your calm mean despair or hope/ is your eye clouded by awareness of truth or of uncertainty"
The collection ends with a bunch of thoughts from Kamienska's notebooks. It is worth it to read every last one.
Kamienska deals with spirituality and the meta-physical as someone who came to faith late in life, which sets a different tone from religious authors who were born into it. It carries a certain uniqueness that I've found lacking in other collections.
My personal favorites include "Doctor Korczak's Lie." I read it the first time, not fully grasping it's meaning, or even understanding what was meant by his lie until I got to the footnote, which reads, "Dr. Janusz Korczak (1878-1941) was the director of the Jewish Orphanage in Warsaw; he accompanied the children into the gas chamber at Treblinka." I went back and read it again and again.
My other favorites come from "The Second Happiness of Job," which are a collection of poems depicting Job's life after God allowed him to be tested.
Some lines:
"But happy Job didn't have the strength to be happy/ afraid he'd betray happiness by a second happiness/ afraid he'd betray life by a second life"
"You suffered through pain/ now suffer through happiness"
"does something exist there/ does your calm mean despair or hope/ is your eye clouded by awareness of truth or of uncertainty"
The collection ends with a bunch of thoughts from Kamienska's notebooks. It is worth it to read every last one.
June 19, 2024
I finished it and then immediately bought a copy for my Slovak mama who started reading it and said "It feels like home." 💙
Full thoughts here: https://gatheringlight.substack.com/p...
Full thoughts here: https://gatheringlight.substack.com/p...
August 19, 2024
Kamieńska was new to me, but she quickly felt like an old friend! The translation of this volume is wonderful--translated poetry can sound muffled but the sharpness remains in this translation. I'll be returning to Kamieńska over and over again. Her work is marked by spiritual acuity, graceful honesty, and emotional insight.
I kept thinking of Dominika's article, which I'd read just before starting Astonishments. It flowed so well with my own reading! I've loved spending the summer with Kamieńska and I don't really want to let her go.
-----
"Hedgehog" (65)
A hedgehog graced us with his existence
with comical fidelity to children's books
a yellow leaf speared on one quill
and black enamel claws
so all of a sudden
we felt wonderfully unreal
while he kept stomping on his way
with all his earthly wisdom
"Lack of Faith" (88)
Yes
even when I don't believe
there is a place in me
inaccessible to unbelief
a patch of wild grace
a stubborn preserve
impenetrable
pain untouched sleeping in the body
music that builds its nest in silence
"On the Threshold of the Poem" (94)
On the threshold of the poem shake off the dust
the powder of hate from your soul
set aside passion
so as not to defile words
Into this space step alone
and the tenderness of things will enfold you
and lead you toward the dark
as if you had lost worldly sight
There whatever was named will return
and stands in the radiance so you and I
can find each other
like two trees that were lost in fog
From her notebooks:
"To write is not simply to arrange words one after another. A poem comes into being only when some mysterious inner energy brings these words to life." (120)
"Rhythm in poetry but also in life--it's not just an external convention and structure of style, but also a reflection of an inner rhythm of feeling, of imagination of mysterious nerve impulses. Rhythm is also a form of discipline too. And discipline is a moral concept. So, we could talk about the morality of rhythm." (120)
"The gift of poetry--it's to speak simply, gently, to name things and concepts. We keep on forgetting about this and it seems to us that all has been already said." (122)
I kept thinking of Dominika's article, which I'd read just before starting Astonishments. It flowed so well with my own reading! I've loved spending the summer with Kamieńska and I don't really want to let her go.
-----
"Hedgehog" (65)
A hedgehog graced us with his existence
with comical fidelity to children's books
a yellow leaf speared on one quill
and black enamel claws
so all of a sudden
we felt wonderfully unreal
while he kept stomping on his way
with all his earthly wisdom
"Lack of Faith" (88)
Yes
even when I don't believe
there is a place in me
inaccessible to unbelief
a patch of wild grace
a stubborn preserve
impenetrable
pain untouched sleeping in the body
music that builds its nest in silence
"On the Threshold of the Poem" (94)
On the threshold of the poem shake off the dust
the powder of hate from your soul
set aside passion
so as not to defile words
Into this space step alone
and the tenderness of things will enfold you
and lead you toward the dark
as if you had lost worldly sight
There whatever was named will return
and stands in the radiance so you and I
can find each other
like two trees that were lost in fog
From her notebooks:
"To write is not simply to arrange words one after another. A poem comes into being only when some mysterious inner energy brings these words to life." (120)
"Rhythm in poetry but also in life--it's not just an external convention and structure of style, but also a reflection of an inner rhythm of feeling, of imagination of mysterious nerve impulses. Rhythm is also a form of discipline too. And discipline is a moral concept. So, we could talk about the morality of rhythm." (120)
"The gift of poetry--it's to speak simply, gently, to name things and concepts. We keep on forgetting about this and it seems to us that all has been already said." (122)
February 27, 2025
One of my favorite collections of translated poetry.
Job is such a discomforting figure for me, and for me, Kamieńska’s poems on the second happiness of Job are the most effective I’ve read on the topic.
There are so many poems here that I love! I also appreciate the included journal notes.
Job is such a discomforting figure for me, and for me, Kamieńska’s poems on the second happiness of Job are the most effective I’ve read on the topic.
There are so many poems here that I love! I also appreciate the included journal notes.
August 3, 2016
This little volume of poetry surprised me. Delicately sensitive and insightful, with intriguingly paradoxical thoughts. Excellent, elegant translation too.
Read
June 2, 2024There is a poem in here for Simone Weil and one for Edith Stein. And much much more. I think you'll like them.
At the end are excerpts from her Notebooks. It was her Notebooks I first wanted to read, after reading Milosz's poem about reading her Notebooks. The excerpts are too few. Somewhere on the internet, some poetry journal, I once found many more of them, exquisitely translated. Hope I saved them somewhere where they may still be safe.
ETA: Here is the link to A Nest of Quiet: A Notebook by Anna Kamienska. Translation by Clare Cavanaugh. (https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poet...)
Industrious Amazement: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poet...
In That Great River: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poet...
At the end are excerpts from her Notebooks. It was her Notebooks I first wanted to read, after reading Milosz's poem about reading her Notebooks. The excerpts are too few. Somewhere on the internet, some poetry journal, I once found many more of them, exquisitely translated. Hope I saved them somewhere where they may still be safe.
ETA: Here is the link to A Nest of Quiet: A Notebook by Anna Kamienska. Translation by Clare Cavanaugh. (https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poet...)
Industrious Amazement: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poet...
In That Great River: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poet...
June 9, 2018
"Leaf/ teach me to fall/ on the indifferent earth." This brilliant, inquisitive collection is unfortunately out of print, but it's still easy to find. It contains both poems and excerpts from the notebooks, which seem to become a favorite mode in Anna Kamienska's later years. Readers like myself who don't appreciate religious poetry might have to skip a few pages that are especially god-friendly. There is plenty of depth to explore here in any case.
June 10, 2021
Moments of beautiful clarity adrift in poetry that is simply okay.
Some of these poems are very beautiful. Most were forgotten by me once I turned the page. Not a poetry collection I would read again.
Some of these poems are very beautiful. Most were forgotten by me once I turned the page. Not a poetry collection I would read again.
July 3, 2020
This poet/collection was recommended to me by someone whose taste I respect, and it is utterly gorgeous. As ever, I read this collection slowly to savor each one. Kamienska is joining Neruda as one of my fave poets.
June 30, 2023
Stunning. Beauty from suffering, insights from common grace.
I only wish that more of Kamieńska's works could be translated into English.
I only wish that more of Kamieńska's works could be translated into English.
December 9, 2013
This happens with me, with poetry: when I finish a book I put it down with a wry face and think well I didn't like that at all, that wasn't at all for me. And then I proceed to spend the next days and nights haunted by certain phrases, stanzas, that suddenly seem to be just shy of revelation.
I write in order to comprehend not to express myself
I don’t grasp anything I’m not ashamed to admit it
sharing this not knowing with a maple leaf
I read Kamienska alongside Vanessa Place, that wisecrack skewer-your-heart maltheist poet. Kamienska believes in small and wild and beautiful things, which includes both hedgehogs and the life-after-death of her dearest dead, but Place batters down her belief, crunches it under her belligerent sailor's boots, Kamienska never wrote something that could fight. My pre-frontal cortext shrugs that Place is right, but go for a walk away from roads and the body starts humming the prayer:
Souls of animals
of the fawn mangled by dogs
of the hare hanging head down
with a torn ear
of the rooster jumping without a head
of the bitch trailing a thread of blood
of the pigeon with glazed eyes lying under a fence
oh souls of animals
pray for us
I particularly liked her Notebooks, pithy aphorisms like: "All words are lies in the face of death, because all hopes are lies. Words are futile hopes. The lump of earth, the stone, the hungry patch of green do not lie."
And after all Kamienska's entire point is that rather than a clear, steady narrative we can only trust the sparks of astonishment. That seems to be what the book has left with me.
I write in order to comprehend not to express myself
I don’t grasp anything I’m not ashamed to admit it
sharing this not knowing with a maple leaf
I read Kamienska alongside Vanessa Place, that wisecrack skewer-your-heart maltheist poet. Kamienska believes in small and wild and beautiful things, which includes both hedgehogs and the life-after-death of her dearest dead, but Place batters down her belief, crunches it under her belligerent sailor's boots, Kamienska never wrote something that could fight. My pre-frontal cortext shrugs that Place is right, but go for a walk away from roads and the body starts humming the prayer:
Souls of animals
of the fawn mangled by dogs
of the hare hanging head down
with a torn ear
of the rooster jumping without a head
of the bitch trailing a thread of blood
of the pigeon with glazed eyes lying under a fence
oh souls of animals
pray for us
I particularly liked her Notebooks, pithy aphorisms like: "All words are lies in the face of death, because all hopes are lies. Words are futile hopes. The lump of earth, the stone, the hungry patch of green do not lie."
And after all Kamienska's entire point is that rather than a clear, steady narrative we can only trust the sparks of astonishment. That seems to be what the book has left with me.
March 5, 2016
On the Threshold of the Poem
On the threshold of the poem shake off the dust
the powder of hate from your soul
set aside passion
so as not to defile words
Into this space step alone
and the tenderness of things will enfold you
and lead you toward the dark
as if you had lost worldly sight
There whatever was named will return
and stand in the radiance so you and I
can find each other
like two trees that were lost in fog
June 13, 2008
Striking imagery and contemplative musings. Kamienska's poetry is often personal and confessional without being over-done or casting about for validation for a pity party. Many of her longer poems succeed (and I confess I generally dislike poems that extend beyond one page) but her shorter poems pack a concentrated punch.
May 16, 2020
"Take in your hand the gray wafer of day
for the moment of reconciliation has arrived
Let there be reconciled
apple with knife
tree with fire
day with night
laughter with sobbing
nothingness with body
Let there be reconciled
loneliness with loneliness"
-- "The Moment of Reconciliation"
for the moment of reconciliation has arrived
Let there be reconciled
apple with knife
tree with fire
day with night
laughter with sobbing
nothingness with body
Let there be reconciled
loneliness with loneliness"
-- "The Moment of Reconciliation"
October 11, 2018
“Tell me what’s the difference
between hope and waiting
because my heart doesn’t know
It constantly cuts itself on the glass of waiting
It constantly gets lost in the fog of hope”
between hope and waiting
because my heart doesn’t know
It constantly cuts itself on the glass of waiting
It constantly gets lost in the fog of hope”
January 24, 2021
I stumbled upon this poet when someone at work shared a poem by posting it to my office door. The poem was “A Prayer that Will Be Answered.” Such a beautiful and sad poem! Filled with Duende and the Light of the Holy Spirit all at once. How I wanted to like the book. Unfortunately, I find the translations stilted, nothing like the uniqueness of the poem that I received, which was translated by another. I do like the Job poems, but the language and awkward lines and line breaks prevented me from being astonished. Perhaps there’s a better translation?
January 25, 2019
A remarkable selection of her poetry but she was much more than a poet. She was variously a Polish communist intellectual and a marginalized supporter of democratic reform. These poems reveal nothing of that aspect of her life but treat the wild grace of human hope in the face of war, loss and uncertain but consoling faith.
July 20, 2025
Wholly unexpectedly, I've found a new favorite poet. Kamienska is one of the most readable poets I've ever read, and I think "Astonishments" is a perfect title for the book. She has this way of latching on to beauty and meaning and hope in small things amidst awful sorrow. I'm so glad I read this book - I plan to read a lot more Kamienska.
December 22, 2020
I loved this, and I want to own it, and I wish much, much more of her work had been translated into English! There is a beautiful deceptive simplicity to her poems, and so much space in them, even the ones about grief.
November 19, 2021
This was the first book of poetry that made me tear up. Anna Kamienska was able to convey true searching, pain, sorrow and many other emotions in a way that I don't think any other book of poetry has done for me. I would highly recommend this collection.
October 9, 2022
These poems and fragments are beautiful. She's threading light into darkness with such clarity. The poems have a graceful simplicity that is not loud but precise. I knew early on that this one would become a favorite.
September 29, 2024
I loved these simple, deeply thoughtful and insightful poems. The author lived through WWII - and she saw it as clear eyed as anything I have read. Her poetry is translated beautifully and well in this collection. It is giving me a lot to think about.
June 28, 2020
With bits of brillance, this is a book to wander in, wander out, again & again.
June 2, 2023
Review to follow
Displaying 1 - 30 of 36 reviews