Philoctetes (excerpt)
Our elders always talked of the dead and the heroes.
Strange words that haunted our sleep, horrible words
that slipped under closed doors, just out of the banquet
hall where voices and glasses flashed and the peplus
of an invisible dancer fluttered noiselessly
like a diaphanous divider whirling between
life and death. That vibrating rhythmical transparency
of the peplums, somehow consoled our childish nights
as it dispersed the shadows of the shields that were
depicted on the white walls by the lingering moonlight.
They prepared our food along with the food of the dead.
At mealtime they took jugs of honey and oil
off the table and carried them to unknown tombs.
We couldn’t distinguish between wine amphorae and
funereal lecythus; we couldn’t distinguish between
what was ours and what belonged to the dead. The tap
of a spoon on the plate turned into the unexpected finger
that tapped our shoulder in rebuke. We turned to look.
Nothing.
Manolis Aligizakis 