ÜBERMENSCH’S HOPE
With gifts from Mars, the Übermensch’s hope
lights fires in our hearts
till longing becomes flesh
and the oak bends down before the mushroom
and you, symbol of bravery, unerring
shield of freedom, are degraded
by the weak and crafty merchants
like the worms that eat the fallen lion’s carcass.
Gone is the beast with its proud talons
that frightened earth and sky, gone are
the walls painted by gunpowder and blood,
but if these verses could survive
and live as you have lived, they’d sing
for you and shatter those who ravaged you.
Manolis Aligizakis 