N O B E L B E C A U S E O F A R T L E S S N E S S

Nobel because of artlessness

Translation: Mirka Zakinthinou

Copyright ©: Dimitris E. Soldatos, 2009Neochori, Lefkada 31084 Greece

www.dimsol.blogspot.comEmail: dimisold@gmail.com

Elias Kontogeorgis PublicationsCopyright ©: 2008 for Greece and worldwide

Elias P. Kontogeorgis“ta Nea tis Lefkadas”Efstathiou Zakka 44Lefkada 31100 GreecePhone: 0030 26450 21494Fax: 0030 26450 29494Http: www.nealefkadas.grEmail: tanea@otenet.gr

In the veins of real art flows zero negative:It gives blood to everybody and takes only from itself

PREFACE OF THE TRANSLATOR

The Greek writer Gregorios Xenopoulos (1867-1951) said that“translation is like awoman: if she is faithful is not pretty and if she is pretty is not faithful”.When you’re dealing with a language as rich as Greek, this gets even harder,especially in this book where even the title itself is a game of words. Translated intoGreek the title “Nobel because of artlessness” means something “artless”, but if you say thesewords together you hear “Nobel Prize in Literature”.

This book is full of contrasting words. In almost every phrase in each verse you findhigh technique satire given with the simplest of means even in the sonnets that theyrequire quite a condensation of meaning. Apart from that, a characteristic trait of thepoet’s writing is that “he judges life’s misery with an imposing truth”, to guoteShelley, that he is said to have inspired Alfred Nobel.In the magazine “DIAVAZO” No 487, page 86, Kostas Kanavouris writes:“Disrespectful and sacrilegious, with that underground tenderness that satire has,merciless and yet straightforward, Dimitris E. Soldatos wipes everything out”.

Mirka Zakinthinou

NOBEL BECAUSE OF ARTLESSNESS

Of the poetry Muse loverif you are, don’t fondle – strike!Even if you are not regarded as poet –without a scarf, without a pipe!

The chabbering of everyonemakes my stomach sick.And my proud postureaffects my verses so muchthat I stand outbecause I stand upwhere the others bend.

That’s why I won’t bowto critics of art,in order to be regarded as an artistbut straight away I will be self-proposedfor a Nobel because of artlessness.

Sour I will get receptionin the circles and the unionswith lemon showerswhich is the best thing for my upset stomach.

But even if all these “bury me”I will be absent from my funeraltaking the title of the poetpoetic licence!

SHORTAGE OF WATER

We have no wells, we have no springs,just a few cisterns, empty as well.

G. Seferis

The Muses became nunsand the art in the rocksthat was spout, that was spring,now it’s a wound.In the cisterns, that have all gone dry,frogs croak.

There they are, at the corner of the roadthe poor artists –because they’re deaf, because they’re blindthink they’re Beethovens and Homers.

REVERSED SONNET

Before gangrene reachesreach the ends by walking,otherwise you will be mutilatedby the contaminated average.

The years have given the spiritand the ephemeral became eternal.I bring up viruses for your computers.

I break satellite dishes for my fun.In order to pay your heavy taxesI give back to you the blood of the wars.

In the glamorous nonsense of the fashionI oppose my worn cloak.Using money instead of kindling woodI will burn the stinking rich,so that wealth acquires a meaning.

In the supermarkets nectar and ambrosia,but I will reach Olympus mountain on foot.Turtle a Ferrari – don’t make me laugh! –in the formula that imagination races.

PROFESSIΟNAL ORIENTATION

Two handfuls of rice per three in China.The blacks have become fly eaters.The days of the white are black, so cry!I’m telling you, the prostitutes and the undertakers

they will not starve from hunger.If you want to spend your time well and swellspeedy education begin –study with the shroud makers.

My child, be awake and alert.You win life, if you slaughter your soullike an animal is being slaughtered by a blade.

I also wanted from a young boy to become a slapon people’s cheek – don’t laugh! –but from all the slaps I got “I have seen stars”.

POSTS

A lifetime you’re looking for a post.Convenience is your lust and laziness.You’re waiting from the clouds to fallso you can sit comfortably, a chair.

A post at the P.O. of your neighbourhoodand the fine little salary when it comeswill send your dreams registered to their fulfilment,when before the unfulfilment was their receiver.

A post of the big plansworthy – a little post for you to possessinside the conscience of the others.

Since you have no more self-esteemtake two posts: one in the officeand one in the public cemetery!

“WOMEN”

Women with dollars in their eyes.Long hair – short brained and pretty.Lovers of the Vain, forever passionate.Affectionate mothers for every lie.

Women that epicentre and topiclike to be in the partiesstealing Miss Stupid’s crown.Young ridiculous and mature fatal.

Women-tombs, shouting like morons,filling their empty inside them spacewith Gucci orgasms and Fa Cad’ oro.

Women that the word woman don’t deservethey don’t even worth you becoming a misogynist.Respect your saliva – do not spit on them!

CHRISTMAS $PIRIT

With how many lightswill you decorate your sadness this year?

(sprayed on a wall)

In the butcher’s polythene bagsthe turkeys are buried.And the slaughtered innocent little treesthey shroud with lights.This year the red ballsare in fashion – no others.And the blood from Palestinechants “Peace on Earth”.

In the supermarkets with couponsyou win presents – happy shopping!On the Coca-Cola tin canSanta Claus appears like a little bear.And the old year the granddadwith lifting looks younger.

Times full of emptiness.Seasons greetings, Christianity!

THE GLASS PLANET

You push a button and you travelhardly having walked at allfrom your couch that you slouchstill, like a log, like a tree.

You push a button and you make fun ofthe ones you want to be alike.And from all those you get slappedyou spit on them in front of the screen.

You push a button, a little oneand the world shrinks into a tiny windowthat faces all the Earth,and no one can see you.

You push a button – how simple –and bombs explode in your living room.In this war remain fearless,nobody is going to kill your fears.

Button after button you have undressed it all.I leave you in naked TV viewingsalong with violence and erectionthat fill you up with sperm and blood.

I WANT TO CHANGE MY LIFE

I want to change my lifeMeans the life I lead is no longer good for me

But it’s easier to change the sizeIf the shoes are too tightThan change your lifeEven if you have become a numberYou probably estimate it less than your feetYou need your feet to runWhen you chase the bread of every dayTo eat or not to be eatenWhen you run run runWhen they betray you or when you betrayWhen you run run runTo aim the aimless by movingYou need the legs to open themAnd lift them highEvery time you fallAnd the hands to point at yourself in the mirrorWhen you put on a smile when you go outWhen you go out of your faceTo be liked to those you don’t likeOnly butTo plant a bullet in their skullAnd because you can’t, you take your revengeBy loving them like you love yourself

I want to change my life meansThat the deeds do still respond to wordsIf they don’tTo want to change my life doesn’t mean a thing

I HAVE NO STYLE

Stilus (in Latin)

I have no styleStyle have the dolls and dummiesAt the fronts of the shopsI broke the front – where to enter?After all I’ m not a doll I have no styleStyle have the sailors and the buildersI turned the sea into inkAnd the making of verses isn’t regarded as work I have no styleStyle have the Athenians and the country politiciansI consider the language the capitalThat doesn’t have peripheryAnd the “cross” – in the voting slip – I’m entitledI think I’ll keep it for my grave… I have no styleStyle have the movie starsAnd the footballersI was but a shooting starThat was kicked about I have no styleStyle have those who believe in somethingOr nothingI was the something and thereafter the nothingThat once dreamed of everything I have no styleStyle have the many and not what expiresStyle have the sellers of ideasAnd the idealess citizensStyle have the years that jump off the balconySo I don’t live them.Style have the anniversaries of the national holidaysAnd the unjustified death of the heroesStyle have the grandfathers and grandmothersWhen they tell fairytalesAnd their grandchildren when they buy themStyle have the machinesThat grind coffee and meat and sometimesThose that grind people –But never those who made them

I have no styleOnly a dagger (stil-etto) up my backAnd a pen (stil-o) to poke my eyes out

ABOUT DISGUISE

When the Carnival is overone and only favour I’d want:nobody removes their mask –wear it on throughout the year.

And the citizens and politiciansof this landless are disguisedwhen they hide their face.

UNDERAGING

You reach to an ageWhen you think you have settled –The most dangerousThe age of certainty –The most uncertainTo the age of the incalculable calculations –The most unreasonableSuddenly you love mathematicsYou hate literatureYou pass in the class with average degreeAnd ignore that you know just about anythingYou read the ephemeral in huge titlesAnd the huge in small lettersStuck in the armchair in your pyjamasAware of eternal sleepYou think you’ve maturedWhich means you are at a stage before rottingYou reach to an ageWhen you think you have settledIn your ideas your wishes and your beliefs

I have no idea what I want and what I believeIf I hadI would be at an ageWhere I should review

MEMORY PAVED WITH OBLIVION

All is forgotten – remember this!It fades like a colored pictureWith black and white peopleSlowly the yellow fadesIt gives its place to the whiteThat pretends innocenceFor its criminal apathySometimes highSometimes low, lifeAnd never love in betweenBetween only emptiness (vacuum)The vacuum of air that I inhaledWhen your breath got away

Shades undefinely familiarLike eyes that we first sawAs if we knew them from another lifeIn the nights they speak to meWith a sweet singing from birds on embalming trees

While there’s time yetI revoke the thrills from the silky skinWhen a hint of touch couldDazzle the “doesn’t last” of every certaintyNumerous timesIn the prairie of the voracious ephemeralWith the hyperaemic poppiesAnd the anaemic anemonesThe eternal grazedInexperienced, I too bled itIn every lie transfusion

What so simply diedReminds the farewell of two shaking handsThat slipped like electric eelsIn love with mud…

“Eli, Eli”“The Place of the Skull” wherever you are notAnd a “lema sabachthani?”From Good Thursday crucifiedSpinkles me with blood – why did you abandon me?

My eyesThe whole world can drown in one tear onlyAnd with one tear to floatWhen the impossible consentsNeverthelessLike everything newly-madeLike Adam and EveLove has its fallIt doesn’t have a fig leafOnly Judas’ ropeOn naked branches hangedJudas is missingSince Judas could anyone of us become

Now, allow me to wash my handsIn the oblivion of timesFor you to be acquittedFor all the crimes I’ve doneAs for example that I love you

ATHENS ACADEMY AWARD

She was begging right next to the Polytechnic SchoolSerbian woman dressed in black around seventyHolding a sign with misspellingHiding her face behind itMaybe out of shame from beggingOr maybe from despairThat nobody showed her any mercyShe was crying silentlyIt was that same day that I was getting my awardFrom Athens Academy for my poemsBeing happy I gave in to her sorrowHanding her 2 eurosI would give something moreIf, the last moment, didn’t thinkThat perhaps the whole thing was a rogueryShe took the coin with tears in her eyesShe kissed it and made the cross signAs if she was thanking God for her daily breadThen I went back and patted her hairLike a Serbian poet would probably doTo my mother who would beg in his countryThe same evening in the AcademyWhen the president handed me the awardI held it in my hands full of emotionAnd I kissed the parchmentMaking the sign of the crossThat God – the good luck – helpedI remembered the Serbian motherAnd thought that sometimesWhen need beA coin in the hand of a hungry womanIs equal with an Academy AwardIn the hands of an ignored poet

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This poem is not included in the Greek edition.It was published in “ta Nea tis Lefkadas”, number 941.

MARATHON RUNNER POET

Poetry is the marathon you run with your hands.The marathon is the poetry you write with your feet…

The (Greek) poet faces 24 letters.The marathon runner 42 kilometres –You just reverse the number.

They both need a sense of rhythmStep by stepTill the last verse is completeAnd till the last metre is finished,On the lines of the copybook and of the road.Step by stepSolitude accompaniesThe poet in the labyrinth of the phrasesAnd the runner of the long distances.

The tradition wants the messenger to be anonymous*In Athens uttering “we have won” he passes awayHinting that the messageIs more important than the messengerLike the poem must beMore important than the poet.

The marathon has to contain poetryAs poetry also has to be marathonianOtherwise we are all “defeated”.

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This poem is not included in the Greek edition. It was published in “ta Nea tis Lefkadas”, number 1007.

* After the Marathon battle between the Greeks and the Persians in 490 B.C.a soldier messenger ran all the way to Athens to carry the message of victory.Upon his arrival, according to tradition, the only words he managed to say before he died were “we have won”.The marathon was consecrated in the first Olympic Games of Athens in 1896, in memory of this event. Although later historians tried to guess his identity,the name of the messenger remains unknown.