Grzegorz Wróblewski

SOCIETY ORIENTATIONS

Renoir again, though there have already been
many poems about him and because of this ladies
cried bitter tears and an art connoisseur
ran about distracted, with a stomachache etc.
So it’s this hapless Renoir again,
it’s clear, his old age wasn’t
pleasant, he suffered just like any other
ailing grandpa, but why does it always
lead to societal conflicts
when you, God forbid, say that his father
was a tailor and had the eyes of a common sadist?

(The Portrait of Renoir’s Father, 1869; Saint Louis, City Art Museum)
(Translated from the Polish by Adam Zdrodowski & Joel Leonard Katz)