Thanos Mikroutsikos

Keep returning again and again and carry me away
beloved sensation
Keep returning and carry me away.
When the memory of the body rises
and old desire runs through the blood again
When the lips and the skin recollect
And the hands feel as if they touch again

keep returning again and again and carry me into the night
When the lips and the skin recollectReturn

Επέστρεφε συχνά και παίρνε με τη νύχτα,
Όταν τα χείλη και το δέρμα ενθυμούνται

I came a long way to get here
I don’t know anymore where I belong
How much earth I will measure before I go out on the water
In what places I will return again
What new people I will find

They divide life into daily workloads
They take miracles with prescriptions
Caresses are the hands’ sobbing
And kisses sorrows’ breaths

So many instances of waste, so many of wrath
How many nests destroyed
Born for other great fires
I do not return where they have wronged me
I do not return where you want me to

They divide life into daily workloads
They take miracles with prescriptions
Caresses are the hands’ sobbing
And kisses sorrows’ breaths

Above the sun and beyond the light
Somewhere farther even than time
Another wind which resembles an oracle
calls out to me to finish with them
It does not count again, time

They divide life into daily workloads
They take miracles with prescriptions
Caresses are the hands’ sobbing
And kisses sorrows’ breaths

(translation: Eva Johanos)

Μοιράζουν τη ζωή σε μεροκάματα
Παίρνουν τα θαύματα με συνταγές
Τα χάδια είναι των χεριών τα κλάματα
Και τα φιλιά της λύπης οι αναπνοές

In a canoe you set off and wander
During the hours when the rain becomes strong
To the land of the Visigoths you travel
Where hanging gardens win your heart
Yet you fret and rub your wings together

Salt covers your naked torso
I brought you sweet water from Delphi
you said your life will be torn asunder
and before I can deny you three times
rust takes over paradise’s key

A caravan gallops in the desert
and follows your wayward trail
how can the mind be soothed by linens
how can the Mediterranean be held by rope
love–we called you Antigone

What nocturne stole your light
and in what galaxy will I find you now
this is Attiki — a gray quarry
and I a cheap firing range
where foreign soldiers, cursing, train

Ποια νυχτωδία το φως σου έχει πάρει
και σε ποιο γαλαξία να σε βρω
εδώ είναι Αττική φαιό νταμάρι
κι εγώ ένα πεδίο βολής φτηνό
που ασκούνται βρίζοντας ξένοι φαντάροι

I always have on me, tightly on my belt
an old african steel knife
like those which the arabs use to play with
which I bought from an old merchant in Algiers

I remember, as if it were now, the old junkman
who looked like a Goya’s old oil-painting
standing next to long swords and torn uniforms
telling me with a hoarse voice the following words

“This knife you want to buy
is surrounded by strange stories
and everybody knows that all those who ever had it
killed some person known to him

Don Basilio killed, with it, Dona Julia,
his beautiful wife, because she cheated on him
Conte Antonio one night, his poor brother
with this knife secretly murdered

An arab his little mistress, because of jealousy
and some Italian sailor a Greek boatswain-
From hand to hand- it finally ended up on my hands…
I have seen many things but this terrifies me

Lean and look at it, it has an anchor and a blazon
it’s light, feel it, it doesn’t even weigh a quarter
but I would advise you to buy something else.”
“How much is it?” – “Only seven francs, since you want it, take it…”

A small dagger I have, tightly on my belt
which capriciousness made me obtain it
and since I hate no one in the world to kill
I am afraid that I might someday turn it against myself

Ένα στιλέτο έχω μικρό στη ζώνη μου σφιγμένο,
που η ιδιοτροπία μ’ έκαμε και το ‘καμα δικό μου,
κι αφού κανένα δε μισώ στον κόσμο να σκοτώσω,
φοβάμαι μη καμιά φορά το στρέψω στον εαυτό μου…

And here, this is what I want to tell you now
In India, in the city of Calcutta,
they blocked the road for a human being.
They bound him in chains, there where he was walking.
That is why, then, I don’t permit myself to
raise my head to the starlit universes.
You will say, the stars are far away
and out earth is so, so small.

Well, then, whatever they are, the stars
I stick my tongue out at them.
For me, anyway, the most amazing thing,
the most imposing, most mysterious and biggest thing
is a human being whom they obstruct from walking,
is a human being whom they have bound in chains.

(translation: Eva Johanos)

Ε, το λοιπόν, ό,τι και να είναι τ’ άστρα,
εγώ τη γλώσσα μου τους βγάζω.
Για μένα, το λοιπόν, το πιο εκπληκτικό,
πιο επιβλητικό, πιο μυστηριακό και πιο μεγάλο,
είναι ένας άνθρωπος που τον μποδίζουν να βαδίζει,
είναι ένας άνθρωπος που τον αλυσοδένουνε.