Mount Helicon
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In December 9, 2019 The High Window published a supplement of translations from Modern Greek Poetry under the curatorship of Manolis Aligizakis. Here is another selection of work by four poets which, like those previously published, are taken from Manolis’ monumental anthology, Neo-Hellene Poets: An Anthology of Modern Greek Poetry: 1750-2018 , copies of which can be purchased by following the link to Amazon. Highly recommended also, for those interested in exploring further the riches of modern Greek poetry, is Manolis’s own website: https://authormanolis.wordpress.com/
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The Poets
Kostis Palamas • Tasos Livaditis • Miltos Sachtouris • Antonis Fostieris
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Kostis Palamas: Five Poems
ORPHIC HYMN
Beyond the minds of the thoughtless
functionary and orphic hymnist
I bring back the hymn
of an ancient light worship
as my thoughts run to it now
a river stashed away
the people’s buzzing but a surprise
to the rhythm of my guitar
that during the night I start to climb
the difficult to reach mountain top
first I wish to hail the Apollonian light
while down where people live
sleep and darkness still prevail
HUMILITY
My pride to stand before you
naked: down with my pride
I bring you my soul, a tender flower
I bring you my thought, my orphanhood
I bring you my love, my poverty
I’ve come to be caught in the net of your lust
I bring you the mirror that reflects
all the sunsets and all the stars
as you wish them, as your desire longs
to smash it to pieces with your golden hands
to the lands of immenseness: dreamy
voyages, wishes for a safe trip
but instead of these I want to be
the earth on which you’ll step
with your beloved tender soles
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
TWO EYES
The oil of my lamp burnt out
and I keep vigil. What a night!
No star, only a ghost with two
eyes nailed at the edge of my bed
the world has vanished sucked into
the mouth of the dark Abyss
only two eyes exist over the void
two eyes that fill nothingness
only two eyes that lit the darkness
all are asleep, vanish, disappear
only two awaken eyes gaze me, they don’t
go to sleep: their eyelids will never close
GOLDEN RIVER
My glance runs free, vanishes
through the waves and clouds up high
only to stop where the sky
touches the sea and talks
the asleep shore blows the breeze lightly
a bird turns white the sky becomes black
the night arrives only the west turns rosy
the day resembles a smiling corpse
and when the west’s joy departs
we’ll gaze the moon in our lake
creating a wide river of gold
that time, my fresh love, I’ll say to you
deep in our hearts, sea filled with passion,
this golden river is our Love
Kostis Palamas was the Greek poet who wrote the words to the Olympic Hymn. He was a central figure of the Greek literary generation of the 1880s and one of the cofounders of the so-called New Athenian School along with Georgios Drosinis, Nikos Kampas, Ioannis Polemis. Born in Patras, he received his primary and secondary education in Mesolonghi. In the 1880s, he worked as a journalist. He published his first collection of verses, Songs of My Fatherland, in 1886. He held an administrative post at the University of Athens between 1897 and 1926, and died during the German occupation of Greece during World War II. Palamas wrote the lyrics to the Olympic Hymn, composed by Spyridon Samaras. It was first performed at the 1896 Summer Olympics, the first modern Olympic Games. His funeral was a major event of the Greek resistance: the funerary poem composed and recited by fellow poet Angelos Sikelianos roused the mourners and culminated in an angry demonstration of a 100,000 people against Nazi occupation.
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Tasos Livaditis: Four Poems
SIMPLE TALK
I would like to speak
in a simple way
as one unbuttons his shirt
and reveals an old wound
like your elbow that feels cold
you look
and discover there’s a hole in your garment
as a comrade sits on a rock and mends
his undershirt.
To speak of whether I may come back one day
carrying a dirty mess-tin full of exile
having in my pockets two tightly held fists
to speak
in a simple way —
but for a moment let me put down my crutches.
Once we dreamed of becoming great poets
we talked of the sun
now our heart pierces us
like a nail in our boot.
When once we said: sky, now we say: courage.
We aren’t poets anymore
only comrades
with big scars and even bigger dreams.
The wind that screams just outside our tent
the barb wire fastened on the belly of the night
a broken oil lamp
the oil drips
Thomas’ face in the gauzes
probably red and swollen from the rifle butt hits
a smell of smoke and dirty feet.
Elias says: the weather will change
Dimitris is silent
and Nikolas
struggles to fill the holes of the tent
with a piece of boiled potato.
Someone coughs. We are cold.
The footsteps of the patrol are heard.
Tonight we decided to write you a letter, mother
that perhaps we may hear the rain
drip on your worn out clogs
that perhaps we may see your smile
hanging from your chin over our thirst.
They feed us rotten potatoes: do not worry
they curse us and they hit us: please love us
perhaps we may never return — but you keep lighting
the lamp, mother, others will return.
Now you probably gather the white cloths of the exile from
the cloths-line
you stitch the patch of your concern on our socks
you know, mother, we’ll never use the gloves
you knitted for us
we gave them to a comrade who was taken away
to be court marshalled
we also gave him a can of food and a piece of
our palm
he tied the edge of his sack with a string
he tossed the sack on his shoulder
and we saw him climbing the hill
with his thin legs scissoring the opposite
sky into pieces.
Every morning they count us
every evening we count the leftover plates
the leftover grief in our eyes
as the rain throws the dice with the policemen
while night falls and the whistles start rumbling.
Now we want to put our hands in our armpits
to look whether a star gleams in the sky
to remember that face
against the opening of the door
but we can’t remember
we have no time to remember
we don’t have time but to stand tall
and die.
My beloved
perhaps I feel cold when it rains
perhaps I caress the crumbs of memory
in my pockets
my palms that once held you are still hot
but I can’t return.
How can I deny the piece of hardened bread that twenty of us
shared
how can I deny my mother who expects from me
a cup of sage tea
how can I deny our child to who we promised a piece
of the sky
how can I deny Nikolas —
who was singing while they aimed to execute him.
If I return we won’t have a lamp to light, we won’t
know where to place our dream.
We’ll sit silently
and when I shall look at you
the holed boot of the comrade I denied
will cover my eyes like a cloud.
Do love me.
And when I return
holding my heart like a big bundle
we’ll sit on the worn out steps.
I don’t like my calloused hands anymore — I’ll say.
You’ll smile and hold them in your palms tightly
a star will chime in the moistened sky
perhaps
I’ll cry.
Today we opened our day
like a sack forgotten by the years.
We searched to find the socks you wore, comrade
your hands
your life that ended.
Grief threw a handful of nails
into our eyes.
Then we washed the cookhouse
we started the fire
and two of us shared a cigarette
under the ragged clouds.
Here our lives are egg shells under
their feet
with death so ever close
and how can you sing
from a patch on the hole of your elbow
with the name of the dead comrade
like a fork piercing your tongue?
It’s enough that we speak
in a simple way
as one is hungry in a simple way
as one loves
as we die
in a simple way.
THE DEFEATED
He kneeled and laid his forehead on the floor. It was
the difficult time. When he got up his embarrassed face
that we all knew well had stayed there on the planks like
an useless upside turned helmet.
The same man returned home without face — like God.
PIGSTY
Things have changed; these days they don’t kill, they only
point at you with the finger and it’s enough. Then they make
a circle that always becomes smaller, they slowly get closer
you retreat back against the wall until in desperation you, alone,
open a hole to hide in it.
When the circle is cleared in its place stands another in every
respect lovable man.
THE SIXTH DAY
It was the sixth day of creation; mother was dressed in black;
she wore her good hat with the veil “God shouldn’t had done this
to us” she said; at the far end pale workers put together the big
stage of the circus.
“Come back home, it’s late”.
“Which home?” I asked and hugged the lamp-post of the street
My young cousin was almost dead when I pushed her behind the
closet, “I love you” she’d say but I had already undressed her, like
a whore. When we buried her, I stayed there forever, behind the
closet, half eaten by the mice and it was the sixth day of creation.
Pulleys grunted as they lifted the first clock up to the roof
of the station.
I sat by the side of the street, so sorry, that even the blind
could see me.
Tasos Livaditis was born in Athens April 20, 1922. He was enrolled in the Law School of the University of Athens. German occupation interrupted his studies and his involvement with the Resistance and the political party EPON. His father, bankrupt by this time died during the occupation years and while the poet was exiled in Makronisos his mother also died. In 1946 he got married to Maria Stoupa, the valuable companion of his life and they had a daughter, Vassiliki. That same year he made his first literary appearance with the publication of his poem The Hatzidimitri Song in Elefthera Grammata. In 1947 he coordinated the release of the literary magazine Themelio. In 1952 his poetry books Battle at the Edge of the Night and This Star is for all of us were noticed. He was the recipient of the First Poetry Prize in the World Youth Poetry Festival of Warsaw 1953, the First Poetry Prize of the City of Athens, 1957; the second National Literary Prize for poetry 1976; the First National Literary prize for poetry 1979.
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Miltos Sachtouris: Five Poems
SAVIOR
I count the fingers of my severed hands
the hours I’ve spent on these windy roofs
I have no other hands, my love, and the doors
don’t close and the dogs are uncompromising.
With my naked legs deep in these dirty waters
with my naked heart I long (not for myself)
for a light-blue window
how have they built so many rooms
so many tragic books
without a shred of light
without a short breath of oxygen
for the sick reader
since each room is but an open wound
how can I descent the tumbled stairs again
among the bog and the wild dogs
to bring medicine and rosy gauzes
and if I find the pharmacy closed
and if I find the pharmacist dead
and if I find my naked heart on the window display of the pharmacy
no, no, it’s all over, there’s no salvation
the rooms will remain as they were
with the wind and its cane fields
with the ruins of glassy moaning faces
with their achroous bleeding
with porcelain hands opened towards me
with the unforgiving forgetfulness
they’ve forgotten my fleshy hands which were severed
as I was measuring their agony
DIFFICULT SUNDAY
Since morning I’ve been gazing up high a better bird
since morning I’ve been enjoying a snake wrapped around my neck
broken cups on the carpet
purple flowers on the cheeks of the seer
when she lifts the skirt of Fate
something will sprout out of this joy
a new blossomless tree
or a pure young eyelid
or a beloved word
that wouldn’t kiss the lips of forgetfulness
bells chime out there
my imaginary friends wait for me out there
they’re lifting up and circling around a dawn
what tediousness, what tediousness
yellow dress — the embroidered eagle —
the green parrot — I close my eyes — it caws
always always always
the orchestra plays cheap tunes
what passionate eyes, what women
such love, such cry, such love;
love my friend, blood my friend
give me your hand, my friend, such cold
it was freezing
I no longer know the time they all died
and I remained with my amputee friend
and with the company of a bloodied twig
PRESENTS
Today I put on
the red warm blood
people love me today
a woman smiled at me
a girl gave me a conch
a boy gave me a hammer
today I kneel down onto the sidewalk
I nail the naked legs
of the passersby on the slabs
they’re all teary eyed
yet no one of them is scared
they’ve all stayed in places which I reached
they’re all teary eyed
yet they gaze the neon signs up high
and the female beggar who sells Easter Bread
on the sky
two men whisper
what’s he doing? Is he nailing our hearts?
Yes, he’s nailing our hearts
for he’s the poet
SEA FLOOR
A sailor up high
dressed in white
runs along the moon
and from earth the girl
with red eyes
sings a song
that doesn’t reach him
it reaches the harbour
reaches the ship
reaches the masts
but it doesn’t reach up high to the moon
MINE
I write to you
afraid and from inside a dark tunnel
lighted by a lightbulb as insignificant as the eye of a needle
a wagon passes over me carefully
maintaining its distance that it won’t hit me
I on the other hand pretend I’m sometimes asleep
other times I pretend to mend a pair of old socks
since everything around me have strangely become old
yesterday at the house
as I opened the closet it turned into dust
and with all the cloths in it
the plates break soon as you touch them
I’m scared and for this I’ve hidden the forks
and knives
my hair has become like a wasted piece of cloth
my mouth has turned white and it hurts
my arms are made of stone
my legs of wood
three boys cry around me
I don’t know why they call me mother
I wanted to write to you about our old joys
but I’ve forgotten how to write about joyous things.
Remember of me
Miltos Sachtouris was born in July 1919 and died March 2005. When he was young he left his law studies to follow his real passion, poetry; using the pen name Miltos Chrysanthis he wrote his first poem, The Music of My Islands. Sachtouris met Nikos Engonopoulos in 1943 and later worked with Engonopoulos on Ikaros. In 1960, he began publishing When I Talk to you and The Spectres, or Joy on the Other Street. Two years later, in 1962, he received the Second State Poet Prize for The Stigmata. He later wrote The Seal, or The Eighth Moon, and The Utensil. He had a long relationship since 1960 until his death with the artist Gianna Persaki who was the creative director in most of his publications after 1960 and he dedicated to her among many collections Skevos and several poems including The Clocks Turned Upside Down. He died at the age of 85 in Athens on the morning of Tuesday, March 29, 2005 and was buried in Athens.
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Antonis Fostieris: Five Poems
UNSUSCEPTIBLE TO IMMORTALITY
Three hours are enough to write a beautiful poem
yet thirty years aren’t enough to write a poem
even if you desire it a lot and you’re willing to sacrifice for it.
I understand spring is a matter of routine for nature
that hates pneuma and blackens the imperishable.
Think carefully: every form of immortality stands opposite
the concept of being. Every opposition
will vanish under the heel of time
that straddles over it with soles made of granite.
Opening the suspicion of the present
and burning
the brushwood of events into the fire of the sun up to the sky
where present
means the past of the future
or better the future of a different past
since, as far as I know, there’s no recipe
to make a moment last.
How greedy
we’ve truly been, how prodigal
in our avarice. Who would believe
that we’ve spent the little eternity that belongs to us
lost in the desert of words. We’ve seeded and waited
for the new fruit to sprout from the seed
leaving
the ripened fruit to rot.
Truly how empty-handed
how unsusceptible to immortality mortals are.
TO THE SILVER MOON
Oh moon, is it true you’re made of silver?
And all these people standing on the velvety display window
uttering emotional whispers
perhaps
they glance you, they weigh you, they evaluate you
with their eyes?
I can’t find any other explanation. You enhance
the wish of possession and totally thrilled
people pull aside the curtains or they charge
to see you from their balcony. Heavenly traps
await for you and they’ve sent two bears to track
your scent. Be mindful of the Archer’s arrow
and the poison of the Scorpion, oh Moon,
it must be true you’re made of silver. Accept that
only what can be sold has value and is respected
by all. We all honour the sold out.
Devil, ten thousand verses have been written for you
and none of them relates to the most basic, not even
a moneychanger dared make an offer clearly.
The unapproachable usually stays behind
although people crave it
therefore, make the first move
now that I see you whole and pregnant
because from tomorrow you’ll start becoming less
and then who will throw his good money
for your silvery
your ephemeral
underweight body?
DOMESTICATED FOREST
In your fresh living room a forest rustles
the furnishings that you hear breathing
still keep watch as if by instinct among
the wings of leaves. And if they shiver
when a visitor comes in it’s because
they sense the hidden axe being sharpened
this time like a painless affectionate smile.
They panic during the nights
and the big nail of their roots cracks into
the rock of the cement. Their branches
ravage the ceiling — look at the cracks
of the wood that roars. Leave them alone.
Neither truth nor craftiness smoothens the knots
into the bark of old age. Leave them.
And if the tic-tac of the worm mimics
their heart beats
they still dream of a heroic fire
to come and finally separate the pneuma
from the flesh —
the shine from the ash
BOY AT THE MUSEUM
A boy has slept in the museum
for the last three thousand years
his bones have shuddered in the cold
they got full of holes for the stubbornness of the irrevocable.
A boy gets up from his bed at night
pulls the curtains aside to see the moon
the wild light startles him and he sleepwalks to the roof
just a little more and he’ll climb up to the clouds
just a little more and he’ll clean out God’s beard
I’m lying, I’m lying a boy sleeps in the museum
eons trickle cold water on him
the eons buzz in his ears like bees
eons of ants around his mattress
just a little longer and he’ll rip the curtain of his sleep
he’ll get up and crying we’ll hug each other
THE THOUGHT BELOGS TO MOURNING
I re-desert the silence of my soul
and I re-enter into the thunderous lithography
of nothing (stone cylinders grind syllables
that we won’t miss the eloquent poem) black bread
made of black flour — has anyone ever thought
why when typing the words always turn
black?
What genetic inclination decided
that every thought belongs to mourning? What instinct
slaps the fragrant boys of symbolism
who shockingly let the obvious to escape them?
Often I end up sensitive
pretending to be emotional
and now with what hands can you knead bread
with what courage can you finish the poem?
Antonis Fostieris was born in Athens in 1953. He studied Law at the University of Athens and History of Law at Sorbonne, Paris. Since 1981, he co-edits and directs the literary magazine The Word. Fostieris is one of the eminent poets of the so-called Generation of the Seventies, which is a literary term referring to Greek authors who began publishing their work during the 1970s, especially towards the end of the Greek military junta of 1967-1974 and during the years after democracy was restored in Greece. Fostieris has been considerably translated; that includes translation into English by Kimon Friar (1984), the acclaimed translator and scholar for his Modern Greek literature translations. For Fostieris fundamental existential questioning is of outmost importance: heritage, a person’s belonging to his roots, lineage, the ghostly image of Death, memory and loss, darkness, the continued advance and retreat of dichotomies, and also Eros and its power, passion, language and its proper use as well as poetry in general, as to where is headed and its influences from abroad. He lives in Athens.
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