Selections of Modern Greek Poetry

THERMOPYLAE

Honor to those who in the life they lead
define and guard a Thermopylae.
Never betraying what is right,
consistent and just in all they do
but showing pity also, and compassion;
generous when they are rich, and when they are poor,
still generous in small ways,
still helping as much as they can;
always speaking the truth,
yet without hating those who lie.

And even more honor is due to them
when they foresee (as many do foresee)
that in the end Ephialtis will make his appearance,
that the Medes will break through after all.


Constantine Cavafy (1863-1933)

               "DRINKING THE SUN OF CORINTH..."
 

    
Drinking the sun of Corinth
Reading the marble ruins
Striding across vineyards and seas
Sighting along the harpoon
A votive fish that slips away
I found the leaves that the sun's psalm memorizes
The living land that passion joys in opening.
  
I drink water, cut fruit,
Thrust my hand into the wind's foliage
The lemon trees water the summer pollen
The green birds tear my dreams
I leave with a glance
A wide glance in which the world is recreated
Beautiful from the beginning to the dimensions 
of the heart! 

                 Odysseus Elytis (1911-1996) 

                         13-12-43  

 Remember me telling you: when the boats whistle don't be 
 in the port. 
 But the day that was leaving was ours and we didn't want
 to ever let it go 
 A bitter handkerchief will greet the tedium of return. 
 It really was raining a lot and the streets were deserted 
 With a delicate, vaguely autumnal flavor 
 Closed windows and people so forgotten 
 Why did they all leave us? Why did they all leave us? 
 I was clasping your hands 
 And there was nothing strange in my cry. 
   
 . . . One day we'll leave noiselessly and we'll roam 
 Through roaring towns and over desolate seas 
 With but one desire burning on our lips 
 It is love that we sought and they denied it to us 
 You forgot about our tears, our joys and our memories 
 Greeting while sails rippling in the wind 
 And maybe there's nothing else left for us to remember. 
  
 The anguished Why heaves up in my soul 
 I suck in the air of loneliness and desertion 
 I knock on the walls of my damp prison and I don't expect
 an answer         
 No one will ever touch the extent of my affection and 
 sadness. 
  
 And you're waiting for a letter which doesn't come 
 A far-off voice revolves in your memory and fades away 
 While a mirror gloomily measures your face 
 Our lost ignorance, our lost wings. 
 

                      Manolis Anagnostakis  (1925- ) 

                        Our Sun 

This sun was mine and yours; we shared it. 
Who's suffering behind the golden silk, who's dying?       
A woman beating her dry breasts cried out; `Cowards, 
they've taken my children and torn them to shreds, you've 
killed them gazing at the fire-flies at dusk with a
strange look,lost in blind thought.' 
The blood was drying on a hand that a tree made green, 
a warrior was asleep clutching the lance that cast light 
against his side. 
It was ours, this sun, we saw nothing behind the gold 
embroidery then the messengers came, dirty and breathless, 
stuttering unintelligible words 
twenty days and nights on the barren earth with thorns only 
twenty days and nights feeling the bellies of the horses 
bleering and not a moment's break to drink rain-water. 
You told them to rest first and then to speak, the light had 
dazzled you. 
They died saying `We don't have time', touching some rays 
of the sun.
You'd forgotten that no one rests. 
  
 A woman howled 'Cowards' like a dog in the night. 
 Once she would have been beautiful like you with the wet 
 mouth, veins alive beneath the skin,with love. 
  
 This sun is ours; you kept all of it, you wouldn't 
 follow me.      
 And it was then I found about those things behind the 
 gold and the silk: 
 we don't have time. The messengers were right. 

                    George Seferis (1900-1971) 

                  The Orange Trees of Sparta 

 The orange trees of Sparta, snow, flowers of love 

 sprang into whiteness at your words, 

 bending down their branches, 

 I hugged them to my small breast and went to my mother. 

 She was sitting under the moon worrying about me, 

 she was sitting under the moon and scolded me: 

 Yesterday I washed you, yesterday I changed you, 

 where did you run off to- 

 who filled you clothes with tears and 

 bitter orange blossoms. 

                Nikephoros Vrettakos (1912-1991) 

    Technorati : Constantine Cavafy, George Seferis, Greece, Greek Poetry, Manolis Anagnostakis, Nikephoros Vrettakos, Odysseus Elytis

Comments

[kat]

I have Google alerts set up to tell me when someone links to my site, and for some reason this post came up today though I'm nowhere to be found. I have to believe it was for another reason, and now I'm compelled to tell you so.

The project I'm working on has been a challenge, not only because past strikes made it impossible to do my job and I also lost one because of them, but because it has brought up both painful and sentimental feelings about my relationship with this country. I can see, even touch her beauty, but I cannot enjoy it and I wonder how and why I was chosen to teach others to do what I cannot.

[Stavros]

Kat,

I have not answered your comment right away because I had to think about what you are saying and how to respond.

Greece is a double sided coin. One side is everything that each of us love about it and which draws us to it. The other more, ominous side is the Greek reality which is difficult to contend with even under the best of circumstances.

Right now Anna is in Greece taking care of her seriously ill father, who recently suffered a heart attack. When I call I listen to the litany of the trials and tribulations, made even more difficult and stressful by a medical system that has serious problems. All I can do is listen. We are helpless to change things and in the long run we can only do our best to play the hand we have been dealt and have faith that God will not give us more than we can handle.

Hang in there.