A Beautiful Milleress Poem by Justyna Bargielska

Yesterday I was walking across the desert,
already in the dark, and something
growled at me quietly. A sensation
not just any, of warmth, M.


The fear like from an old book: she's afraid that she can become a panther
and she's not turned on by it at all, because what does a panther do? Can a panther
not close her mouth for a picture, can she go to bed in her new shoes?
When a panther looks at bread, it goes stale, that's her gift.
A milleress also has a cool gift, to reanimate meat.

But she'd like to have one thing from a panther: when someone comes and says
a train that exists only on schedule has just left, she'd like to be able
to say oh, has it? And not try to eat the sun to stop it from setting.

Translation: Katarzyna Szuster