Vermeer’s Little Girl, by Adam Zagajewski

Vermeer’s little girl, now famous,

watches me. A pearl watches me.

The lips of Vermeer’s little girl

are red, moist, and shinning.

Oh Vermeer’s little girl, oh pearl,

blue turban: you are all light

and I am made of shadow.

Light looks down on shadow

with forbearance, perhaps pity.

From “Mysticism For Beginners” by Adam Zagajewski, translated from the Polish by Clare Cavanagh (Farrar, Straus and Giroux: 70 pp., $18)