The BlueIris Semi-Nightly Poem Thread, 10/21/07 [View All]

[BlueIris]

"Brueghel's Two Monkeys"

This is what I see in my dreams about final exams:
two monkeys, chained to the floor, sit on the windowsill,
the sky behind them flutters,
the sea is taking its bath.

The exam is History of Mankind.
I stammer and hedge.

One monkey stares and listens with mocking disdain,
the other seems to be dreaming away—
but when it’s clear I don't know what to say
he prompts me with a gentle
clinking of his chain.

—Wislawa Symborska
(Translated from the Polish by Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh)