Neon
Under the slick gleam of city
stars and blaring horns
you wish to be entrapped
would prefer to mingle
and drape your solitude
with transience, garment of
indefinite multiples of
companions, even if lasting for
moments, lights and music from doorways
simply to capture desolate emotions
distill them to sure
numbness when wintry you
shoot up, hoping to glissade into a
new kingdom of delight
CIVIL SERVANTS
The civil servants melt and wither
in pairs like columns in the office
the city and Death must be
the electricians who replenish them.
They sit on their chairs, they scribble
without reason on innocent white paper
along with this correspondence
we have the honour they affirm
and only honour’s left to them
when they climb up the street
at night eight o’clock as if tuned
they buy chestnuts, think of the law,
the exchange rate and shrug their shoulders
the poor civil servants.
Ancient Supper
They brought the golden pitcher, the big silver bowl.
They washed their hands, sliced bread, ate.
The ephebe wasn’t hungry. He was silent. He was
examining the face of the stranger when, sometimes,
his fork created a shadow like a mast.
Then the old singer tuned his guitar.
Big plane tree leaves fell on the plates
next to the bones of cattle. Multi oared ships, from
the Neios harbor, came through the door and
stood upright in the middle of the hall. Him, with
the hairy, naked chest held the yoke of the last ship
having blindfolded his eyes with a white kerchief.
DIFFERENCES
What did you finally risk? What you got
to know of our years in your own skin?
Have you ever accepted the irreversible without
hesitation? Then, how you secure the right
of your certainty or your doubt?
But, let it be. We have to go beyond our differences.
And I have to crush this secret belief in my superiority.
4
Some years ago you said
‘Basically I am a matter of light.’And still today when you lean
on the wide shoulders of sleep
even when they anchor you
to the drowsy breast of pelagos
you search in corners where blackness
has turned thin with no resistance
you grope for the spear
that spear destined to pierce your heart
and open it to the light.
Back to the First light, a tribute to Lawrence Ferlinghetti by Lidia Chiarelli
Light on the Walls of Life
To Lawrence Ferlinghetti for his 101st birthday
Teach me to paint
the light on the walls of life.
Teach me
to look at the world
as you see it
to become a tear of the sun
a hill of poetry
a word in a tree.
Lead me
to see the sun
hitting the sheer cliffs
the tides that restlessly ebb and flow
the water birds challenging the wind.
Let’s listen together
to the breath of rustling leaves
the perfect hush of a starry night
the sound of summer in the raindrops.
Here and now
help me reach the very shores of light
waiting for
the renaissance of wonder
with you
again and forever.
Lidia Chiarelli, Italy
ΦΩΤΙΣΕ ΤΟΥΣ ΤΟΙΧΟΥΣ ΤΗΣ ΖΩΗΣ
Δίδαξε με να ζωγραφίσω φως
στους τοίχους της ζωής
τον κόσμο να κοιτάζω
όπως κι εσύ
το δάκρυ του ήλιου να γενώ
λόφος ποιητκός
κόσμος ενός δεντρού.
Οδήγησε με
να δω τον ήλιο
να πέφετει στις πλαγιές
και στις παλλίρριες που πάνε κι έρχονται
στους γλάρους με τον άνεμο
που πολεμούν
Μαζί ν’ αφουκραστούμε ανάσες
στο θρόϊσμα των δέντρων
της πάναστρης νύχτας την τελειότητα
τον ήχο του καλοκαιριού στις στάλλες
Εδώ και τώρα βοήθα με
να βρω του ήλιου την ακρογιαλιά
να περιμένω
του θαύματος την Αναγένηση
μαζί σου
και για πάντα.
Μετάφραση Μανώλη Αλυγιζάκη//translated by Manolis Aligizakis
Lidia Chiarelli, Italy
Teacher
It was a foggy day when, like students, we entered
the school; found the teacher writing on the board
something narrating a familiar fable which we found
tasteless. The teacher welcomed us, especially the initiate,
who always inspired admiration with His graceful persona,
His stature and it was as if He led us to a garden full
of bloomed flowers, playful butterflies hanging from
threads of air, colorful spring, and the teacher repeated
to his students, ‘attention children attention, it isn’t
often that we have such a special visitor’, Übermensch
laughed and obviously pleased He said: ‘these students
are tomorrow’s Übermenschen.’
Consequence
During the farewell dinner, he and his company got
drunk (all of them less than twenty years old). Past
midnight they took the roads with the laurel bushes,
ivy, guitars, and they decapitated the statues. Come
dawn he went away to Sicily. His trial took place while
he was away. They convicted him to death; then it was
the treason too and the defeat and the prisoners who
died in the quarries (some seven thousand) and
Sparta that received him with laurels. We knew well
the bitterness hiding in his arrogance. He only
missed Athens;
and Athens missed his beauty in the Agora and in
the Arena.
The Error
He spoke eloquently using simple words slightly abstract
as it suits a master of speeches However at one point
an unforgivable mistake – that word
it should had been left out so that the deep loss the absence
would be more obvious Then of course we forgot
whether that word was the word cape or the word hammer
Manolis Aligizakis 