I mean: what are we to  each other? A gear? A witness? A prop in someone else’s story? Or something quieter an excuse the group uses to feel coherent. Society loves roles the way a stage loves costumes. They spare us the embarrassment of improvisation. If you are “the leader,” you speak. If you are “the clown,” you soften the room. If you are “the serious one,” you carry the weight so everyone else can pretend it isn’t there. The strange part is that we often put on these costumes without...

I’ve always wanted to meet a writer, an artist. Not for an autograph, not for a photo. My dream was a conversation: why they write, what art is for. Why write at all, when life can be so shamelessly incomprehensible. During a conversation with my one and only “poet,” I realized that what I really want is to hug Szymborska. It was hard to decide whether I needed her more, or she needed me. But it’s probably me who needs her.  Kubik, Mariusz. “Photograph of Wisława Szymborska (1923, Bnin,...

By four o’clock the day is already slipping away when I leave school and the sky is red along the horizon, smoke held in the cold air like a breath no one lets go. I think of fire, of firemen who burn houses, books, ideas. No one shouts. No one protests. Somewhere there is only a whisper, thin as a page, carrying a book out of the blaze. I read “Fahrenheit 451” in November. It’s a small excuse for a theme, maybe, but the world outside matched the pages inside. The colours of autumn looked...