Loveless work, boring work, work valued only because others haven’t got even that much, however loveless and boring – this is one of the harshest human miseries.
WISLAWA SZYMBORSKAAt the very beginning of my creative life I loved humanity. I wanted to do something good for mankind. Soon I understood that it isn’t possible to save mankind.
More Wislawa Szymborska Quotes
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Life lasts but a few scratches of the claw in the sand.
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They say the first sentence in any speech is always the hardest. Well, that one’s behind me, anyway.
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I like being near the top of a mountain. One can’t get lost here.
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You can find the entire cosmos lurking in its least remarkable objects.
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I prefer the absurdity of writing poems to the absurdity of not writing poems.
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Secret codes resound. Doubts and intentions come to light.
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Let the people who never find true love keep saying that there’s no such thing. Their faith will make it easier for them to live and die.
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All is mine but nothing owned, nothing owned for memory, and mine only while I look.
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When I pronounce the word Future, the first syllable already belongs to the past. When I pronounce the word Silence, I destroy it.
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Somewhere out there the world must have an end.
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Poets yearn, of course, to be published, read, and understood, but they do little, if anything, to set themselves above the common herd and the daily grind.
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All imperfection is easier to tolerate if served up in small doses.
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Keep up the good work, if only for a while, if only for the twinkling of a tiny galaxy.
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Every beginning is only a sequel, after all, and the book of events is always open halfway through.
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In every tragedy, an element of comedy is preserved. Comedy is just tragedy reversed.
WISLAWA SZYMBORSKA






