Entry in an Unknown Hand - Franz Wright

And still nothing happens. I am not arrested.  

By some inexplicable oversight

nobody jeers when I walk down the street.

I have been allowed to go on living in this  

room. I am not asked to explain my presence  

anywhere.

What posthypnotic suggestions were made; and  

are any left unexecuted?

Why am I so distressed at the thought of taking  

certain jobs?

They are absolutely shameless at the bank—

You’d think my name meant nothing to them. Non-

chalantly they hand me the sum I’ve requested,

but I know them. It’s like this everywhere—

they think they are going to surprise me: I,  

who do nothing but wait.

Once I answered the phone, and the caller hung up—

very clever.

They think that they can scare me.  

I am always scared.

And how much courage it requires to get up in the  

morning and dress yourself. Nobody congratulates  

you!

At no point in the day may I fall to my knees and  

refuse to go on, it’s not done.

I go on

dodging cars that jump the curb to crush my hip,

accompanied by abrupt bursts of black-and-white

laughter and applause,

past a million unlighted windows, peered out at  

by the retired and their aged attack-dogs—

toward my place,

the one at the end of the counter,  

the scalpel on the napkin.

Afraid - Gösta Ågren

He was afraid of freedom,

for he wanted to be free to

choose it. He was afraid

of happiness, for he was afraid

of the time when the party is

over, also that part of the party

that consists of the time when

it is over. He was afraid of

life, for it lacked

secrecy, and therefore

mercy, and the reward  

for living, death,

was not enough, for

he was not afraid 

of it.