RIP Wislawa Szymborska (1923-2012)

I just heard about this via Facebook. Lung cancer. She was 88, so she'd had good innings. Still, it makes me want to yell out cuss words. Here's the New York Times obituary.



She was the first poet whose work really amazed me, I think. I first encountered her in an e-mail of poems sent by Alfian Sa'at, I think, with the subject-line "Wislawa Red-Hot Lava". Ever since then, I've tried to imitate that sense of everythingness, that sense of speaking of the whole world, to the whole world, in my poems. Haven't succeeded much.