Tomasz Bąk might just be the most important voice of the generation born during the period of Poland’s transition to liberal democracy. In his new book, he returns to themes and subjects central to his work.

Against the Cogs, Across the Sands of Thought is the eighth book of poems by Tomasz Bąk – an author who, over the years, has arguably managed to achieve the status of the most important voice of his generation (that is, roughly speaking, people born during the period of Poland’s transition to democracy). The book sees Bąk return to themes that have been central to his work: the depressing absurdities of life under capitalism; the latter’s unstable, crisis-prone nature; bullshit jobs, as well as the kinds of work that still manage to shape the world around us. (The poet’s interest in the latter is clear from the very start: the book opens with a motto from Carl Sandburg, who serves throughout as a patron saint of sorts.) Bąk remains an insightful historical materialist: putting the relationship between storytelling and explanation at the heart of the book, he wants to draw our attention to the fact that today the latter is often omitted in favour of the former, and the fundamental structures that shape the world around us – and which so often remain entirely indifferent to our existence – are often made less clear or less visible by the incessant yarn-spinning. As he writes in the strongly programmatic eponymous poem of the book: “And when I direct my attention to the labour theory of value, / it is not so that I can understand the prices better, / but in order to give the world a form”. Bąk remains interested in the possibility of explaining the world – describing the truths that actually underlie it – rather than writing poems in which his readers will only see the mirror image of themselves.

The poet’s voice in Against the Cogs… is stern and decisive, but this paradoxically allows for an attitude that is perhaps kinder and gentler than ever. In what might just be the most beautiful poem of the book, Bąk describes the superficially perfect life of an anonymous life coach in a manner that is understanding, even tender, but devoid of any tackiness or pretence.

Marta Koronkiewicz

Translated by Paweł Kaczmarski

Creating, not creation

The planet tries to convince us every day that beauty

is an option, and that most of the processes involved in living

are geared to efficiency, which, as it were, by definition

relegates aesthetics to a distant Excel spreadsheet.

But the world is a brain fuelled by hydrogenated fats

and its memory is poor, which is why most of those processes

contain hidden beauty, laboriously squeezed out

by people bound by employment contracts:

the loading of a container ship in the gathering dawn,

the play of sunshine specks on a shirt sleeve, a crispy croissant;

a motivated team plays cooperative Tetris and one by one

only the long blocks fall, the ones that are easy to fit.

And it is altogether lovely. A gentle breeze mixes with the smell of oxidised steel.

The earthy colours of the loading units harmonise with the orange

of the cranes and the blue of the bay. Beauty materialises at the other end

of the supply chain, and the team’s contribution is modest but notable.

Against the cogs, across the sands of thought

Museums and galleries prefer classical forms

not out of a love of beauty, but rather out of longing

for something that can be easily talked about:

when the incomprehensible pervades everything around us, we are

all the more eager to direct our gaze to the red bus shelter,

which remembers several generations of kids with their colourful,

noisy wheels gliding across the asphalt road.

Yes, we have built a world where the burden of anecdotal

evidence is carried in solidarity by the distant family

of the weeping cousin, but that’s not the worst of it.

We can’t stop adding more floors!

And when I turn to the labour theory of value,

it is not so that I can understand the prices better,

but in order to give the world a form.

Clusters

It starts with liquidity issues

at one of the companies in the region’s dominant branch –

furtive, nervous eyes of management, frantic

search for savings, accountants’ sleepless nights,

bitten nails, sallow complexion, falling hair.

In the end, employees are paid in kind

and in department store vouchers and even the best baristas,

veritable wizards of maximising the distance

between the cup and the spout of the coffee carafe

have to look around for another job.

The forces favouring clusters

eventually lead to their demise.

Hence we return to simple tasks

performed with simple tools.

As far as I’m concerned, a hammer will suffice.

The privateers

He was very highly developed in his private life –

whatever that meant. The bread he baked always rose

beautifully, soft on the inside and crispy on the outside.

Whenever he forgot to soak the nuts he wanted to mix in,

no matter, he could still chop them up just right,

and the blender’s blade stayed sharp and lovely. Walks in

the woods? Of course he did: he took a loved one, and the loved one’s

dog; he could tell species of plants and animals with the best of them.

Back home, he enjoyed playing music and other hands-on hobbies.

He knew every proven method to unclog the drain,

and in the bedroom something possessed him and, despite the state of his account,

despite all the development, he quietly asked her to tell him again,

that he had the right to be tired, so that he would never again have to

be tired in vain, so that he wouldn’t have to be tired illegally.

Central European Standard Time, the Time of the End

That part of the end of the world where you still have to

get up early for work, but when you get to the office,

it turns out that the short-haired, middle-aged lady

who, in October 2007, accidentally removed

the Internet Explorer icon from her desktop and thought

that she had deleted the internet (exactly the way one deletes the

internet), really did delete the internet (hey, dear youngsters,

it’s Internet Explorer, so the news spreads slower),

so you don’t really have anything to do, you clean your desk,

pull on your hat, step out into March, step out into the sunshine

and no one can stop you from getting a boob job.

Translated by Paweł Kaczmarski