The Flag
don’t disregard love
the crying eyes aren’t beautiful
however, don’t delay:
you’ll come back soon, won’t you?
each time I dare something
that cloud of hope comes
with white and soft rosy tricky lace.
Be serious:
it’s impossible to set the guillotine daily
slowly your hair will turn white:
white flag.
The other flag is the sign
that you give up and that the castles
tumble forever
Justification
I strode over
fallen branches
victims of last night’s
merciless wind
I listened to music in tune
with endless perfection
when I heard
the chirp of the bird
raised my head
saw it, a chickadee
shivering, singing, laughing
on the tree limb
justification
that I was alive
this morning
Days of 1896
He was utterly disgraced. One of his erotic inclinations,
literally forbidden and condemned
(nonetheless inbred), was the reason:
Society was quite puritanical.
Bit by bit, he lost what little money he had.
Then he lost his position and his reputation.
He was close to thirty years old without ever having worked
as long as a year at least at a job we know of.
Sometimes he earned his expenses from
Interceding in deals that were considered shameful.
He ended up being the type of person who, if you were seen
with him often, it was possible that you could be seriously discredited.
But this is not the whole story. It wouldn’t be right.
Above all, his beauty needs to be mentioned.
There is another point of view, and if he is seen from that angle
he appears likable; he seems simple and pure
young man of love who, without any thought
placed above his honour and his reputation
the sensual delight of his innocent flesh.
And his reputation? But society,
prudish and stupid, made comparisons.
Long-listed for the 2023 Griffin Poetry Awards
https://griffinpoetryprize.com/press/2023-longlist-announcement/
Matter of Lighting
All these took place because each night I followed
my impulse and each time I passed the bridge
I felt my life more foreign to me or I recalled that
I never kissed father while he was alive, despite of all
our poverty, or my cup that dwelt in heavens since
I had always been accommodated in the kitchen
and since one of my legs had rotted in the rain,
the others had to manage my birds, thus I became
an easy target; therefore I now sit in my room where,
with a few cognacs, I finally regain a meaning or I mix
with strange things: sometimes the soup bowl that
steamed in the middle of family supper and other
times this horrible murder you find
when you raise the lamp a little higher.
WINTER LANDSCAPE
The grotesque full moon like a slab of ice,
motionless, standing in the middle of sea,
and a big silent reef, as exposed as my palm
with an old, sad, tragically small cane stick
and a shadow-something, that I don’t know
what I’ve lost, returns, unable to becalm
that lost trio frozen and fully lit
in a silent vigil in the night, in the cold
Hand
Ah, the feathery touch of a hand
unable to commit to darkness
and the limping sparrow hops
and marvels at his reflection
in the shallow puddle thinking
he is the smartest airflow
just before the falcon’s claws
dive in the fluff of his feathers
ah, the diaphanous laughter of the creek
unable to commit to the ocean
and the lonely trout marvels
at his swiftness searching for a mate
against autumnal rush of water
thinking he is the smartest water lily
just before the man’s hook
sets its claw deep in his mouth
Loneliness
Sorrow was hanging in the air; the leafless branches
behind the railings and you were alone by the window.
The night passed in front of your door; it left like
a beloved woman, a woman that another man
was holding from the waist.
And the moon, like a calm, turned off light bulb
at the turn of the road above the drug store.
Paris
Oh Paris, it was time when I scattered
my dreams in your dark mornings
and now I leave you taking with me
the sorrowful joy that I love you.
The Mediterranean delicate siren
that flows around our ship
with all its frothy lilies
now takes me away from you
but we shall meet again in the future
when light will come carefully to open
my eyes before the gleaming blue day
that helps me live with your memory
and then its islands will charge
Athens, I know, isn’t far behind
and they’ll stand and fight
my sinful love for you, oh Paris,
and they will wish me to forget
how sweetly I gave you my soul
not longing to meet anyone
when I aimlessly saunter in your streets
Gratitude
The sense of gratitude
passing through me slowly
reaches
the forests that root in the wind
days in tomorrow’s train stations
we live in nameless streets
by the riverbanks of every number
the cosmos will forget
all who loved it and
it won’t know the number of stars
each person hides in their heart
forgotten in the old mistakes
all lovers are holy and sinful
Eros is a thirst
for whom will be betrayed
shining moment that suddenly arrives
and vanishes in the whirl of eternity.
And if the road is full of truths
the inexplicable moment is still far away
the dream dives into the void and
writes about chancy destinations
in this version of history
they keep time and light like
a legacy of nothing they inherit
from generation to generation
an untidiness of improvisation
a vigilant attraction.
Outside something like a forged spring
and the forever illusion
of keys that open the wide-open door.
Manolis Aligizakis 