Echo
She opened her window
motionless powerful feminine
exhilarating gesture
that shook me
and memory rekindled
paradisiacal kisses
I dreamed of capturing
the echo of a raindrop
falling through fog
into the plaza fountain
greetings, oh life,
here I am too:
splash!
WISE MEN SENSE THE FORTHCOMING
…for gods perceive the future,
most people perceive what takes place now,
and wise men sense approaching events.
Philostratos, “Life of Apollonius of Tyana” viii, 7.
People know what is happening now.
The gods know future events, only they
have complete possession of the light.
But wise men can sense what is coming.
Sometimes their hearing is disturbed
during a time of serious contemplation.
The mysterious roar of upcoming
events reaches them. And they pay attention
to it with reverence. While outside in the street,
the people hear nothing at all.
Peaceful Panorama
On the other side of the window
a garden with orange trees
Intoxicating
the perfume of the blossoms
No people
no cars
a cloudless heaven
Only a blackbird
praising the perfection
of silence.
Germain Droogenbroodt
ΠΑΝΟΡΑΜΑ
Έξω απ’ το παράθυρο
ο κήπος με τις πορτοκαλλιές
το άρωμα των λουλουδιών μεθύσι
δίχως ανθρώπους
δίχως αυτοκίνητα
ασυννέφιαστος παράδεισος
και μόνο ο κοτσυφός
υμνεί την τελειότητα
της σιωπής
Μετάφραση Μανώλη Αλυγιζάκη//Translated by Manolis Aligizakis
Persephone
Perhaps for this reason we finally chose the shadow.
Darkness is black, glossy black, unaltered, without
shades; you’re saved from the effort to choose, for
what reason anyway?
That servant
was black as if made of darkness. You remember?
When he grabbed me we were gathering flowers
in the big plain. The baskets were full of crocuses,
violets, lilies, roses, hyacinths, amaranth. I had stooped
over a most beautiful flower, looked like narcissus,
a narcissus I saw for the first time, with a hundred colours,
a hundred stems over which dewdrops sparkled. And I,
there amazed, leaning over, as if folded in two,
as if leaning over a water well, was looking at my face,
almost self-content, in love with the rosy shadow on
the edge of my lips and with the crisp, ivory contour
between my breasts.
Poem by Kostas Karyotakis
I WANT TO LEAVE
I want to leave this place, to go far away
I want to become golden dust in the air
simple element, free, brave
to an unfamiliar new land I’ll go
where things of the world will appear
like dreams and they’ll talk to the soul
where the nice faces of people will smile
and where I too shall be beautiful
where, my god, darkness wouldn’t exist
in the night, nor in the despair of the place
upon the horrible skyline or in the wind’s wailing
nor in the glances or words of people
where there won’t remain anything
but a little joy and satisfaction
where all will say that they have left forever
that perhaps they are all already dead.
Miracle
It is a miracle – he says – even more than a miracle
where everything is exhausted (and first of all me) I discover
amid the pebbles at the seashore the holy skull
of one of Achille’s horses – perhaps that of Xanthos
amid the chamomiles I discover the Patriarch’s crutch
I lift it reverently I climb up the marble stairs
I don’t pound the steps with it scores of people gather
I stand before the podium I feel my hair becoming motionless
flowing on my shoulders scores of people can’t wait they jostle
I open my mouth to speak and suddenly I understand
that I am deaf and they hear me
The Real Reason
No, it’s not that Apollo took back his promise and
the fact that he spat on Cassandra’s mouth annulled
the convincing of her speech thus making her
prophetic words ineffective for herself and others. No.
It’s because no one wants to believe in truth. And when
you see the net inside the bath, you think that it’s
put there for your fishing trip next day and you don’t
hear at all within you and without, ascending the marble
stairs of the castle, the dark message in the cries
of ill-fated Cassandra.
Principles
You coached leaves of the olive tree to
shred sunlight and you begged
finches to whistle summer
but you left my lips unkissed
except while foreign lands rejoiced
in your principles, behind you
this yellow wall’s firm blocks
of the abandoned building
overgrown with brier where
cicadas compose adagios
gardenias sweating aromas
but you exiled my lips
while only seagulls kept you company
and my sobs hushed the night
Picture by Germain Droogenbroodt
DAWN OF HOPE
The light of dawn
erases the traces of the night.
Relentlessly, time goes on flowing,
although I wish it would stop
like a picture fixed by the camera’s lens
because as valuable like fruit in a tree is love.
Like the moon ascending at night,
so you are, my love.
Whatever happens, wherever you are,
I keep you in my heart.
Since I am in love with you, my world has changed
for two hearts found a home of tenderness.
Sunrays play on the strings of love
lighting up the dawn of hope.
ANNA KEIKO, CHINA
Translation Anna Keiko – Germain Droogenbroodt – Stanley Barkan
ΕΛΠΙΔΟΦΟΡΟ ΠΡΩΙΝΟ
Το λυκαυγές σβύνει
τ’απομεινάρια της νύχτας
ασταμάτητος κυλά ο χρόνος
που θα `θελα να σταματούσε
σαν φωτογραφία στο φακό μηχανής
σαν το φρούτο στο δέντρο
πολύτιμη είναι η αγάπη
σαν το φεγγάρι που φωτίζεται τη νύχτα
είσαι αγάπη μου
κι όπου κι αν είσαι κι ότι κι αν συμβεί
σ’ εχω πάντα στην καρδιά μου.
Που σ’ αγαπώ ο κόσμος έχει αλλάξει
κι οι καρδιές μας χτυπούν με την ίδια τρυφερότητα.
Ηλιαχτίδες παίζουν της αγάπης τις χορδές
φωτίζοντας την πρωϊνή ελπίδα
Μετάφραση Μανώλη Αλυγιζάκη//Translated by Manolis Aligizakis
HEDONISM
A fleshless string of beads made of songs
I haven’t given you today
with the spells and games of a charmer
I’ll cloy you, my love
naked and like a vine I’ll climb
to taste your body that devours me
with my fingers I’ll conflagrate
the tender hairs of your mound
enrapturing wine and milk that soothes
to sleep I’ll bring to moisten you
with all my body drop by drop
and on your white sculptured legs
two vases that drive me crazy
my honey like a maniac, at last, I’ll ejaculate
Manolis Aligizakis 