"A Note"

I'm not a big Twitter follower, but today I checked out some Powell's Bookstore tweets.  One from Feb 2, 2012 caught my eye.

Nobel prize winner Wislawa Szymborska passed away that day.  She was 88.

Her poem "A Note" was the body of the tweet.

A Note

Life is the only way

to get covered in leaves,

catch your breath on the sand,

rise on wings;

to be a dog,

or stroke it's warm fur;

to tell pain

from everything it's not;

to squeeze inside events,

dawdle in views,

to seek the least of all possible
mistakes.

An extraordinary chance

to remember for a moment

a conversation held

with the lamp switched off;

and if only once

to stumble upon a stone,

end up soaked in one downpour or
another,

mislay your keys in the grass;

and to follow a spark on the wind with your eyes;

and to keep on not knowing

something important.