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I have defined poetry as a ‘passionate pursuit of the Real.

Czeslaw Milosz

Do you know how it is when one wakes at night suddenly and asks, listening to the pounding heart: what more do you want, insatiable?
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Fear Listening Night Wake Up Yourself
I was left behind with the immensity of existing things. A sponge, suffering because it cannot saturate itself; a river, suffering because reflections of clouds and trees are not clouds and trees.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Existence Myself River Suffering
Irony is the glory of slaves.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Glory Irony One Liner Slave
A true opium of the people is a belief in nothingness after death – the huge solace of thinking that for our betrayals, greed, cowardice, murders we are not going to be judged.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Belief Betrayal Death Judgement People Theory Thinking True
I knew that I would speak in the language of the vanquished No more durable than old customs, family rituals, Christmas tinsel, and once a year the hilarity of carols.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Custom Durable Language Myself
It was only toward the middle of the twentieth century that the inhabitants of many European countries came, in general unpleasantly, to the realization that their fate could be influenced directly by intricate and abstruse books of philosophy.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Book. Philosophy Country Fate Influence Realization Time
I imagine the earth when I am no more: Women’s dresses, dewy lilacs, a song in the valley. Yet the books will be there on the shelves, well born, Derived from people, but also from radiance, heights.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Book Born Imagination Myself People Radiant Woman
I have defined poetry as a ‘passionate pursuit of the Real.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Definition Passionate Poet Poetry Pursuit Reality
Grow your tree of falsehood from a small grain of truth.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Growth Small Truth Yourself
I’ve always regretted that I’m made of contradictions. But, if contradiction is impossible to overcome, we have to accept both its ends.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Acceptance End Impossible Regret
A weak human mercy walks in the corridors of hospitals and is like a half-thawed winter.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Hospital Human Walk Weakness Winter
The revolt against one’s environment is usually ‘shame’ of one’s environment.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Environment Oneself Shame
What has no shadow has no strength to live.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Live Shadow Strength
Our memory is childish and it saves only what we need.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Children Memories Need Ourselves Save
Even if that is so, there will remain A word wakened by lips that perish, A tireless messenger who runs and runs Through interstellar fields, through the revolving galaxies, And calls out, protests, screams.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Awakening Call Lips Protest Run Scream Word
I liked beaches, swimming pools, and clinics for there they were the bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh. I pitied them and myself, but this will not protect me. The word and the thought are over.
CZESLAW MILOSZ

Bone Flesh Myself Thinking

I have defined poetry as a ‘passionate pursuit of the Real.

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I have defined poetry as a ‘passionate pursuit of the Real.

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