Buffo - Wislawa Szymborska

Another by Szymborska, the Nobel Laureate from Poland.  I'm not quite sure how to categorize it.... I like its concept and breadth, the ironic tone that ends in a note of.... of what?... about love.  You tell me!
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BUFFO

First, our love will die, alas,
then two hundred years will pass,
then we’ll meet again at last—

This time in the theater, played
by a couple of comedians,
him and her, the public’s darlings.

Just a little farce, with songs,
patter, jokes, and final bows,
a vaudeville comedy of manners,
certain to bring down the house.

You’ll amuse them endlessly
on the stage with your cravat
and your petty jealousy.

So will I, love’s silly pawn,
with my heart broken, my joy gone,
my crown tumbling to the ground.

To the laughter’s loud refrain,
we will meet and part again,
seven mountains, seven rivers
multiplying out pain.

If we haven’t had enough
of despair, grief, all that stuff,
lofty words will kill us off.

Then we’ll stand up, take our bows:
hope that you’ve enjoyed our show.
every patron with his spouse
will applaud, get up, and go.

They reenter their lives’ cages,
where love’s tiger sometimes rages,
but the beast’s too tame to bite.

We’ll remain the odd ones out,
silly heathens in their fools’caps,
listening to the small bells ringing
day and night.
                                                                  Wislawa Szymborska - Polish

Love At First Sight - W. Szymborska

Wislawa Szymborska looks like someone's sweet grandmother (which she probably also is!), but in the realm of literature she is in rarefied company as a Nobel Prize winner.  As I am not an academic, I won't expound on what makes her worthy.  As a reader of poetry, I can tell you that she is easy to read and understand, her word choices from every-day usage.  But what she constructs with them!  It's like being given the same set of Lego blocks, and she builds Cinderella's Castle in Disneyworld and we - or at least I - make a squarish Soviet-era building.


This poem appeals to my sense of Fate (or lack thereof) about the things that happen to us.  Is there inevitability and all that preceded it was preparation for the main event? 
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Love At First Sight


They would be quite surprised,
that for a long time
chance had been toying with them.

Not altogether ready
to turn into their fate,
it would draw them together, pull them apart,
cut them off on their path,
and, swallowing a giggle,
leap to the side.

There were doorknobs and doorbells,
where touch lay on touch
beforehand.
Suitcases next to one another in the baggage check.
Maybe one night the same dream,
blurred upon awakening.

Every beginning, after all,
is nothing but a sequel,
and the book of events
is always open in the middle.
                                             

Wyslawa Szymborska - Polish