Excerpt
Tomáš Janovic

Aphorisms by Tomáš Janovic

BETWEEN

Is it difficult, you ladies dear,

to lie between two chairs here?

 

IF

If only we could fit together our egos

like we do with our Legos!

 

CAIN AND ABEL

So all men will be brothers at ease?

Help me, please!

Love is blind and deaf, but it has completely healthy children.

 

GODFATHER

Even for atheists

– I’m sure of this –

godfathers, in fact, do exist.

 

ANGEL

“You’re my angel!” she chatted in a whisper.

But I acted as if I had no gender.

A man is a man, he hardly changes therein.

He wants his own car, his own cottage, his own house and – foreign women!

 

PLATONIC LOVE

You may have to give for this love sage

Nothing more than your whole wage!

Where would humanity be if Noah had embarked in a canoe?

 

BIOGRAPHY

First an erotic.

Then a sclerotic.

 

MENTALITY

Even if you allow them

to use you to wipe

only the finest porcelain,

you will not acquire the mentality of porcelain

only the mentality of a rag

When your wife yawns by your side, she won’t go to bed with you.

 

OPINION

It’s easiest to change your opinion

when you don’t have one.

 

THE PROBLEM OF THE MOUNTED POLICE

A policeman can more easily adapt

to a change of uniform

than his horse can.

 

TORSO

A woman without a head is a torso. Why? Tell me!

After all, what makes a woman a woman is still in its place, see!

 

THE WORD

With frequent usage

All credibility is

Lost by the word

So goes the heart

Eventually akin to a turd

 

DEMAND

The emptier the heart is

the more it demands

additional foreign blood

 

LOOK

Look at the photograph

of your parents

year by year they look

younger

 

A THOUGHT

A thought should never be

too large

to fit

into your head

 

PURPOSE

An eggshell

is broken from without

for one purpose

and from within for another

 

FLAGS

Flags change…even those that are proud…

It’s the flagpoles that remain avowed.

 

A COIN

The start

of a football match

is decided by the tossing of a coin

this is the only time

that money

decides something

in a just manner

 

COMPLICATED PRODUCT

A man is the only

complicated product

during whose production

we can be

absent in spirit

 

WHAT KOHN SAID

                        For Petr Salner

The Lord didn’t love me

when I was born

it was pouring

when I got married

it was pouring

it even started raining

when they dragged me

into the concentration camp

 

Translated by Clarice Cloutier