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Because copying down poems over and over is a form of prayer

A PRAYER THAT WILL BE ANSWERED

by Anna Kamienska

Lord let me suffer much
and then die

Let me walk through silence
and leave nothing behind not even fear

Make the world continue
let the ocean kiss the sand just as before

Let the grass stay green
so that the frogs can hide in it

so that someone can bury his face in it
and sob out his love

Make the day rise brightly
as if there were no more pain

And let my poem stand clear as a windowpane
bumped by a bumblebee's head

(Translated from the Polish by Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh. From A Book of Luminous Things by Ceslaw Milosz.)

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