I don't remember exactly whom I cast my maiden vote for, but it was a vote for freedom. And I have it today, and since then I have voted in every election. Only freedom seemed completely different then from what it is in reality. Back then, above all, it smelled of victory, community, and relief after years of hardship and fear. It tasted like the first trip abroad to the West and the first major open-air concert. It was supposed to mean great change and choices made independently.

I did not know then that a free person must make choices every day. Make their own decision each day. Without support, sometimes without a signpost and the certainty that comes when someone wise and experienced takes you by the hand and helps you get where you want to go. Authorities fell like dominoes, toppled by the fall of one "intellectual," bringing down another, until no one had the strength left to explain anything wisely and give social action a sensible direction. The sense of security and stability based on former values melted like icebergs during climate warming. Inevitably, we were sinking into fear of losing our jobs, respect, family, and identity.

That is why many people give up their freedom, surrender after one misguided choice after another, and want to be driven to the destination, even when it is not their own. Let only someone appear who will defend us from the entire evil world. Escaping from freedom is now characteristic not only of Poles. That is why Marcin Świetlicki's poem is so close to my heart, and if I had to describe where Poland is now, I would say it in the poet's words: "All morning illusions turn into a bitter evening."

Grażyna Hanaf

"For one must be afraid. The face is
cut by the Vistula and slashed by the Oder.
The face wears an age-old grimace
like that of a woman giving birth to a stone. Like that of
someone writing a text message in an unknown language.

And one must be afraid. Now love is powerless,
it exists only in declarations
and recitations. All morning illusions
turn into a bitter evening. It is
later than you think."

[autor Marcin Świetlicki, wiersz z tomu "Polska. Wiązanka pieśni patriotycznych" 2018]