Chapter One I died this past night. There is nothing supernatural about this. Nature kills everyone. Only rocks are immortal. Nonetheless, it’s a bit unusual. You live and you live, then—poof—and you’re six feet under. I don’t like these sorts of sudden reversals, and, what’s more, I’ve read that dying isn’t always in our best
In the history of world literature and culture, there were two thinkers who, with great ingenuity, disclosed the natural inconsistency of being human and the experiences of the individual tortured by desires. They were William Shakespeare and Sigmund Freud. The former created characters with impossible-to-resolve dilemmas for his sonnets and dramas. After Shakespeare, humanity irrevocably
The Logic of Paradox Read More »
Like Rabbits in the Night I received a letter from my old friend Gertrude. In it, Gertrude wrote: “Those horid rabits girdled the pair trees that I werked so hard to grow. The monsters also aet my plum tree with the beutifull blosoms in the spring. And they chewd up my aple trees. You see
Regimantas Tamošaitis Read More »
To many, the texts of Benediktas Januševičius appear lightweight, draw laughter or raise a smile. No wonder the impression or sound catches up with you first, for his texts seemingly invite you for a chat and trigger a multi-sided understanding: since words envelop the image and the sound and are mostly performed, this poetry seeks
Fun Poetry about Meaning Read More »
disabled poem Poems can always be exchanged for other poems – Michael Augustin this text doesn’t have an end and perhaps no beginning either it’s just a text and nothing more this text can’t save the world it’s just a text and nothing more this text has no point it’s just a text and
Benediktas Januševičius Read More »
Apie vandenis, medžius ir vėjus (On Waters, Trees, and Winds), the new poetry collection by the poet, essay and prose writer Donaldas Kajokas (b. 1953), has been almost universally recognized as one of the best recent poetry books. A holder of all possible literary prizes in Lithuania, as well as the Prize of the Baltic
The Freedom of a Master Read More »
No, the Nightingale of Dawn, No, Of Course, Yes! how it trills on an old pulpit in bushes on the Hill of Brides how it trills – O horror – as if admiring the moon in dead Roman ruins admiring it so hopefully with its paleness still able to arouse admiration – arousing eternal
You may have heard of Užupis, that run-down artists’ pocket of Vilnius, Lithuania, cut off from the Old Town by a bend in the Vilnelė (Vilnia), a pleasant little river if ever there was one and not too deep to wade across, as happens several times in Jurgis Kunčinas’s novel Tūla. You may have read
Something inside me always stirs—today too—as soon as I see those two bridges again, the long Bernadine monastery, the narrow gap in the enfilade of little yards, and the little gateway, beyond which spread the real intestines and cloacae of Užupis—how much of it has been walked over with stumbling feet, not with Tūla, without
There have been Lithuanians in Canada and the United States writing in English about their immigrant lives for a long time, starting with the Canadian Antanas Šileika’s (b. 1953) Buying on Time (1997). There may be others even earlier, but at least this is the book that I remember best for its paradoxical humor and authenticity. Not
