Wisława Szymborska

“We call it a grain of sand, but it calls itself neither grain nor sand. It does just fine without a name, general, specific, transient, permanent, erroneous, or genuine.”

“I prefer the absurdity of writing poems to the absurdity of not writing poems.”

“We know ourselves only as far as we’ve been tested.”

“Any knowledge that doesn’t lead to new questions is dead knowledge.”

“The cat in an empty apartment. 'Die?' — you can't do that to a cat. Since what is a cat to do in an empty apartment?”

“When I pronounce the word Future, the first syllable already belongs to the past.”

“My identifying features are rapture and despair.”

“Reality demands that we also mention this: Life goes on.”

“So much is happening every moment that I can't be surprised, I can't be disappointed.”

“In the language of poetry, where every word counts, every word must count.”

“You can find poetry in your everyday life, your memory, in what people say on the bus, in the news, or just what's in your heart.”

“Four billion people on this earth, but my imagination is still the same. It's bad with large numbers. It's still taken by particularity.”

“Even when you're silent, you're broadcasting.”

“It's said that the first love is the most important, but the last love is the most important of all.”

“Life, however long it may be, is always short.”