Real life is elsewhere, but we are here

The text discusses the last volume of Adam Zagajewski's poetry, entitled “Real Life” (Krakow 2019). The author of the review presents in detail three main themes present in this book: nostalgic farewells, records of the inevitable end (existence coming to death) and poetic epiphanies (rare moments of happiness). An important context of the analyzes presented in the text is an intertextual dimension of Adam Zagajewski's poetry, the dialogue dealing with his great predecessors: Czesław Miłosz, Paul Celan, Tomasz Mann and T.S. Eliot.