STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN-UP AND DOWN In 1956 Zbigniew Herbert wrote poem Top of Stairs, which he would publish much later in Report From Besieged City. This volume appeared in 1983 with an emigre publisher, and was immediately reprinted by one of underground publishers in Poland at time. Martial Law was still in effect, and although restrictions were gradually being loosened by (still-confident) military authorities (or simply: junta, as we called then), certainly no one even dreamed of political transformation that was to come five years later. And readers at that time had no doubt that Herbert's poem referred to reality of daily life in totalitarian state in which they lived. The message of poem, as is usually case with Herbert, was by no means unambiguous (today especially, we can see complexity of meanings it contains). Yet at time metaphor of stairs-with those who know standing at top, and at bottom, sweepers of squares, hostages of a better future-- seemed clearly to reflect marked division between them (the authorities) and us (society). One is tempted to read Adam Zagajewski's poem Ruchome schody (Escalator) in context of Herbert's earlier poem-or, more precisely, in context of that earlier reading of Herbert's poem. That is to say, in work of author of Pragnienie (Desire, 2000), one is tempted to see a poetic portrait of a democratic society -just as poem by author of Pan Cogito became a metaphor for situation of a society enslaved by a self-styled dictatorship. In contrast to Herbert's stairs, however, those of Zagajewski are moving-as if this mobility, this constant displacement, were supposed to represent exchange of elites within a democratic system; as if it represented principle of change in a free society that is subject to rule of a just law. And in place of soulless, severe Dictator, there appears the President, laughing and carefree! Even if one were to stay a moment on this particular level of interpretation, in sphere of socio-political reflection, sadness pervading this human landscape would be disturbing. Here we are shown an anonymous capital of Western world, somewhat reminiscent of Paris (St. Bartholomew's Paris): a city bubbling over with insouciance, sated and complacent; a city that has long enjoyed its hard-won rights and freedoms (treating even its own history dispassionately); and with a lofty indifference toward anything taking place outside of itself. Increasingly, it is these large metropolitan areas of Western Civilization that form setting for Zagajewski's poems. For it is there that one can easily observe processes and changes taking place in developed human collectivities at end of twentieth century. First of all, passions have faded and given way to cold irony, mockery, and scorn. Fortunately, conflicts and political clashes, too, are disappearing (another symptom, paradoxically, of decline). The siege of cities, uprisings, and struggles are things of past. Peace and wellbeing now govern this region of world; they have become our lot. But price paid for this is restless craving and boredom-a great boredom that spreads like a depression over a country where everything is subject to negotiation, calculation, deal-making and compromise; where money has taken place of arms, and where lofty emotions have sailed off like a luxury ocean liner on a one-way transatlantic journey. And finally-unification. Physical diversity, diversity of human types, multiplicity of ways of being (So many faces, so many hands) does not translate into a diversity of mind, spirit or character. What triumphs is an overall sameness; there is only one imagination, stimulated by simulacra of mass culture. In his essay Solidarnosc i samotnosc (Solidarity and Solitude), Zagajewski once wrote that a unification of collective will is desirable in sphere of political conflict-while sphere of expression requires quite opposite: differentiation. …