Christos Leontis

If I knew reading, writing
if it was, if it was mine the sword
they would not eat my bread now
I would refuse stealing for my fate

I feel pain for the future generations
The factory workers, the hard fighters
Washerwomen, porters and students
Builders, those who live in the countryside.

I have become tired, not a drop has remained for me
of the strength to lift my head
I failed once again
now others are ruling me

(translation: Eva Johanos)

Κουράστηκα δε μου ‘μεινε σταλιά
δύναμη να σηκώσω το κεφάλι
απότυχα για άλλη μια φορά
τώρα με κυβερνούνε άλλοι

In this corner of the earth
we remained forgotten
my mama, my son, my soil
earth betrayed a thousand times

My mother and my sorrow and joy
my soil and my heart-ache
I sing of you, my eyes
son and beloved of mine

Grab picks and mattocks
sickles and two-pronged pitchforks
Put on a red flower
towards the heart the leaf

(translation: Eva Johanos)

Πιάστε αξίνες και τσαπιά
δρεπάνια και δικέλλια
βάλτε λουλούδι κόκκινο
εις της καρδιάς το φύλλο

So, my brother
we have learned, at last, how to discuss
quietly, quietly and simply.
We understand each other now
nothing more is necessary.

And tomorrow, say I, we will become
even simpler.
We will find those words
that have the the same weight
in all hearts,
on all lips,
so that we can call, anymore,
the figs-figs
and the tub-tub.*

And so that the others may laugh
and say:
“Such poems
I can make for you a hundred an hour.”
That’s what we want after all.
Because we do not sing
in order to separate ourselves, my brother,
from the world.
We sing
in order to unite the world.

(*greek expression meaning to say things as they truly are.)

Κι έτσι που να χαμογελάνε οι άλλοι
και να λένε:
“Τέτοια ποιήματα
σου φτιάχνω εκατό την ώρα”.
Αυτό θέλουμε κι εμείς.
Γιατί εμείς δεν τραγουδάμε
για να ξεχωρίσουμε, αδελφέ μου,
απ’ τον κόσμο.
Εμείς τραγουδάμε
για να σμίξουμε τον κόσμο.

We are smiling deeply within. This smile, we now hide.
An outlaw smile, just as the sun became an outlaw,
an outlaw as well, the truth. We hide the smile,
just as we hide in our pocket, the photograph of our beloved,
just as we hide the idea of freedom, between the two leaves of our heart.
All of us here have one sky and the same smile.

Tomorrow they may kill us. This smile,
and this sky, they cannot take from us.

Αύριο μπορεί να μας σκοτώσουν. Αυτό το χαμόγελο,
κι αυτόν τον ουρανό, δεν μπορούν να μας τα πάρουν.