POEMS
Zbigniew Herbert
LANDSCAPE
It is a windy night and an empty road where the army of the
Prince of Parma
has left dead bodies of horses
bones of a recently captured castle shine on a bald mountain
there is only stone sand dung and wind with no aim or color
What animates the landscape is a moon sharply nailed into the sky
and a few dirty shadows below
also white gallows for on them the thin husks of bodies
are hanging the wind brings them back to life wind without trees
and without clouds
THE NEPENTHE FAMILY
Did Jean-Jacques the Tender know about the pitcherplant
- it was described by Linnaeus he should have known it–
so why was he silent about this scandal of nature
one of many scandals but perhaps
beyond the capacity of the heart and tear-glands
of the one who sought only comfort in nature
this criminal grows in the dark jungles of Borneo
and lures with a flower that is not a flower
but the main vein of a leaf fanned out in the form of a
pitcher
with a hinged lid and very sweet mouth
that draws insects to the treacherous banquet
like the secret police of a certain empire
