Does it symbolize the unknown?
But all things are unknown.

Perhaps mystery?
Don’t say it, we hide enough of it in our minds.

Adventure then.
Nonsense, we play everything for safety.

But it can’t be, the sea must be hinting at something,
not even for a moment does it remain indifferent. You can see that.
I don’t see anything but I feel you
when thoughts sweep along the open sea.
Call them waves if you must or anything you like.

Look here, we’ve only just equated
for you waves may well be giant thoughts
whereas for me it’s a striking folding.
One more test in the world.
A mutually accepted language doesn’t mean identification.
Even if a wave remains just a wave
we can easily sink.

Thoughts travel in such troubled waters, mate!
That’s why we make a mess of things.

A talkative surface it would be without depths.
The risk diffuses sorcery.

But have no doubt
we crave for a turbulent life.
Even tied to a mast.

What can you too tell me, next life’s logotype.

How right Palamas* was.
“Breeze-moving”, you are.
Who knows what else.
Finger-like you rise to solve queries.
A positive diviner, you step blindly on tears
and point straight to the sky.

That’s good, you make absence fertile.
You are not in the least scared.
How different we are.
You living with facts alone
and we only in imagination.

————
*Kostis Palamas (1859-1943): Leading Greek poet and critic.

Philosophized tree.
Its silence promises much.
A sprinkling seems enough, it beckons aerially,
for a many-eyed calm to take root.
It knows what it needs in order to exist.
Buried in its nature
it doesn’t grow taller for someone else
it doesn’t lower with the first blow of comfort.

What has it to do with the rest of us?
In its shadow the humblest suppliant
passes for high-minded.

Inhumanly speechless, it houses a totemic quietude.
And when suddenly it waves like glory
its every nod shows aloofness.
Why is it doing this to me?
Must I live muted again, on promises?

Long ago Solomos* had said:
“Whoever has mysteries
to solve suffers from deliriums.”

It’s time for some light.
Your trunk, O tree, a totally impudent stimulus.
Leafage, roots, branches, pure deception.

Merciless tree
regardless if in the mind comes
the “queen of the forest”,
the “matron of wild beauty”,
Papadiamantis’** royal oak,
all in vain your making out to be a diamond.
And however much you inflame imagination
every moment you merely erect the impending fall.

Unnatural tree.
You neither fool me nor foster me with silence.
Because without a single word how am I to breathe.

Talk to me just for once, damn it! Why do you keep looking at me?
A man am I, I live on words.
And you, abhorrent tree,
you have me choking in oxygen.

———-
*Dionysios Solomos (1798-1857): Leading Greek poet.
**Alexandros Papadiamantis (1851-1911): Influential Greek novelist, short story writer and poet.

You take a sharp turn coming out of the National Road.
At the far end, we, the cool eucalyptus trees.
We stand guards for greatness.
If you turn down the radio
all the more you’ll have the rustling for co-driver .

What an unfavourable magic.
As long as you daren’t change life
all is a mistake, landscapes, trips, co-drivers.

No more evasions.
This is no trip. Sheer solitude.

I, the eucalyptus tree, am telling you so, you can’t get away.
If you haven’t a rooted course, driving off would be incomprehensible.
You’ll be the problem, never the solution.
You’ll look in nature like a strange feature.
And in your eyes, if you have eyes,
in solitude you’ll stay, and continue staying.

I want to believe that Philip*
spoke openly to the fir trees
in a fortified position near Larissa.
Thus he doubled the length of the sarisa**
being wise enough to feel the firs ahead.

There’s no such thing as homeless thoughts.
And all, but all of our aspirations
hanker for some naturalness.
To defeat, but how?

When a logical mind reflects nature,
then nothing seems arbitrary.
Even a spineless fir renders you innovating.

We must prevail. But why?
Just for the idea.
But it’s so natural.
And naturalness is a word without end.
A comprehensible word , nevertheless,
as long as there are Philips.

———–
*Philip II (382-336 B.C.): king of Macedonia.
**Sarisa: a lengthy ancient spear.

1.
Desire under the elms.
We are not acting, of course, or are we not?
Lovers are the biggest hypocrites.
We die supposedly for one another.
We are all tragedians
and bring out passion intact
only on a stage out of sight.
In conceivable elms.
Who gives a damn about the others.

2.
A nightmare on Elm Street
is a lifeless look, are ready words.
If you don’t see the other skin-deep
you’ll often find yourself on this famous street.
On Elm Street.

But pay no attention.
It’s laughable, even though destined
for just anybody, man or woman, to bring terror.

This is not a jungle, it’s a capital city.
Valuable is the most minor action.
No way of thinking about forests and what cedar.
The only horizon is gain.

By force they visit her now.
They are neither harsh nor ungrateful children.
It’s a human matter.
In her hospitable illness they have no place
for joy and they should remain children.
She was crazy, mad as a hatter,
to think in a way
that grandmas live forever.