THE GATE
(Excerpt 7)
I wait for the three women, and the fourth one;
they might not come; I wait for them;
the bicycle is in the basement
the chicken walked in the shop with the big saw;
the man grabbed it by the leg; the chicken cawed
I don’t know whether all saws have the same number
of teeth like people;
I wait, I didn’t give up, didn’t cross my arms,
oh, my old women, my old women, he said,
you who burned your two feathers one by one
over the flame of the oil lamp or the fire of the hearth
not in the fire of half of the city — the bone inside
still whole
to poke your back, so you’ll graze like runaway mares
oh the nights, with the mid-night cries of the dead,
the howls of dogs and wolves,
with the scratched skin of the moon nailed on doors
with the mirror, the glass door, the river, all angry
in the pitch dark
that we couldn’t notice the severed head of your son
in the laundry basket;
you’ll freeze at dawn — moist eaves stuck on your
soles
thistle poked through your dresses, entangled in
your hair
when the first explosions are heard in the gorge
and the statue tumbles as his testicles stir and
the mule drivers carry double sacks of whitewash
on their mules
marking the path with two white lines up to the
hill
high up by the half built church with the half
given forgiveness weighing heavy the olive grove
with what the bells didn’t chime.
The others, still shuffling the cards, argued about
various scenarios;
I left their company, sat by the window; I wasn’t
listening to their complains,
Manolis Aligizakis 