Teresy Ferenc wiersze dla dzieci
Poems for children by Teresa Ferenc

Summary/Abstract: The adult poetry of the author of Wypalona dolina (Burnt Valley) is based on traumatic experiences of the past. Teresa Ferenc in her childhood (in 1943) survived the pacification of her family village in the Zamość region and the death of her parents. In her works for adults, the poet returns to these events, coding them in the images of places and people (especially her mother). Ferenc’s experiences are also phenographically recognizable in the works of her relatives: Zbigniew Jankowski and their daughters. The poetry and prose, e.g. Mała zagłada (Little Extermination) of the older of them, Anna Janko, is even the subject of research in the field of memory studies, its epigenetics, and post-memory narrative. It is significant that in poems for children, Teresa Ferenc separates the young recipient from the images of the evil of war and her own autobiographical memory. Poetess practices the poetics of growth and relationships, which is in fact a tribute to life, its affirmation. Points to the natural development and community (human-non-human) bond as universal factors conducive to the well-being of the child, which also translates into its contact with the environment, based on careful and tender observation, care and responsibility. In two poetic books: Najbliższa ojczyzna (The Closest Homeland, 1982, illustrated by W. Majchrzak) and Drzewo dziwo (Tree-strange, 1987, illustrated by Kurłowicz). Ferenc uses the focalizing volatility of the description, looking at the cycle of nature and the phenomena occurring in it (such as a storm or the hydrodynamics of the sea), without losing sight of the particles of reality (such as a stone, a snowflake, a leaf) to which, using a movable scale and perspective, sometimes also a human being. Ferenc’s poetry forces attention to the world, reveals the bonds and entanglements between subjects and objects, and emphasizes their relational nature.

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