Yiannis Spanos

I will remain an idealistic and unworthy lover
Of distant voyages and azure seas,
And one night like all other nights I’ll pass away,
Not having crossed the hazy line of the horizons.

For Madras, Singapour, Algiers and Sfax
Ships will always set off proud,
And I, bent at an office with maritime charts,
Will enter sums in thick accounting ledgers.

I’ll stop speaking about far away trips
My friends will think at last I have forgotten,
And my mother, happy, will tell whoever asks
“‘twas a youthful inclination that now has passed.”

But one night my self will tower in front of me
And, like a hanging judge, ask me to explain,
And this unworthy wavering hand will take up arms,
Aim, and unafraid strike the one to blame.

And I, who longed one day to lay at rest
In some sea deep in the far-away Indies,
I’ll have a death common and sorrowful
And a funeral like other people’s funeral.

Κι εγώ που τόσο επόθησα μια μέρα να ταφώ
σε κάποια θάλασσα βαθειά στις μακρινές Ινδίες,
θα ‘χω ένα θάνατο κοινό και θλιβερό πολύ
και μια κηδεία σαν των πολλών ανθρώπων τις κηδείες.

There are people who live lonely
Like the forgotten ear of wheat
The world around is an empty field
And they, in the loneliness mist
Like the forgotten ear of wheat
Lonely people

There are people who live lonely
Like the rocks on the wide sea
The world is a sea that spreads out
And they, mute, bowed and alone
Wind-swept rocks
Lonely people

Lonely people like broken dead leaves
Like deserted, forgotten chapels
Lonely people like broken dead leaves
Like deserted, forgotten chapels, like you, like me…

Άνθρωποι μονάχοι σαν ξερόκλαδα σπασμένα
σαν ξωκλήσια ερημωμένα, ξεχασμένα
άνθρωποι μονάχοι σαν ξερόκλαδα σπασμένα
σαν ξωκλήσια ερημωμένα, σαν εσένα, σαν εμένα…

Turbulent, stormy is the sea
and weeping are the mountains
speechless are now our nightingales
sky and heavens shadowy dark
muddy and pitiful my gaze,
good luck my child, farewell!

Dizziness crashing my head
like thunder from the torrent stream,
dried out like desert are my lips
and my breath has been cut short
in this the ultimate last kiss
good luck my child, farewell!

Be tried by my creator,
cursed place of alien foreign land,
our children dear you take from us
and lone you leave us in the blaze,
and so much bitter bile we sip
when we cry them “good luck, farewell!

Να σε παιδέψει ο πλάστης μου,
καταραμένη ξενιτιά,
μας παίρνεις τα παιδάκια μας
και μας αφήνεις στην φωτιά,
και πίνουμε τόση χολή
όταν τα λέμ’ “ώρα καλή!”

Last night you came in my sleep and spoke to me softly
that from abroad my baby you just returned

I run my goodness to receive you by your seaside
To lay comfortably as in old times inside your arms

But I find the seashore deserted and empty are the waves
and I follow the narrow road and go by the cemetery

Last night you came in my sleep and spoke to me softly
that from abroad my baby you never returned

Ήρθες εψές στον ύπνο μου και μου ψιθύρισες
κι από τα ξένα μάνα μου δεν ξαναγύρισες

A rain is falling, and a sorrow all night long
on the low working-class houses
and a candle which like a heart is flickering
shows, also, that I am waiting up for you.

Bitter letters, which all come back to me
but even if they were to find you, I would win nothing
I have learned by now, how one can live, lonely
and wake up with a hoarse dream.

It is a rain which has been continuing for years
but you don’t feel anymore my struggle
you pass like a stranger, and as a stranger what does it matter to you
that a life has been broken into pieces by now

(translation: Eva Johanos)

Είναι μια βροχή και που συνεχίζει χρόνια
μα δεν νιώθεις πια, τον δικό μου τον αγώνα
ξένος περνάς και σαν ξένος τι σε νοιάζει
που μια ζωή έχει πια κομματιαστεί.