Born in Warsaw, Poland, Anna Swir joined the Resistance during World War II and served as a military nurse during the Warsaw Uprising. 

She was a highly respected and popular poet and the life of the literary scene in Kraków, where she lived for most of her life. Her poems about war and death use direct, simple language. In addition to poetry, she wrote plays and stories for children. 

Sharing one of her poems titled, “I’ll Open the Window” –

Our embrace lasted too long.

We loved right down to the bone.

I hear the bones grind, I see

our two skeletons.

Now I am waiting

till you leave, till

the clatter of your shoes

is heard no more. Now, silence.

Tonight, I am going to sleep alone

on the bedclothes of purity.

Aloneness

is the first hygienic measure.

Aloneness

will enlarge the walls of the room,

I will open the window

and the large, frosty air will enter,

healthy as tragedy.

Human thoughts will enter

and human concerns,

misfortune of others, saintliness of others.

They will converse softly and sternly.

Do not come anymore.

I am an animal

very rarely.