translated and presented by David Connolly
The five poets presented here were selected from the collection Sixteen New Greek Poets, published by the “Praxis” Theatre Company (Athens, 1997) following a poetry competition held in September 1996. The competition was open to poets up to thirty years old who had not previously published any book of poetry. Of the 98 poets who entered the competition, 16 were chosen for inclusion in the resulting volume of poetry by a committee of leadng poets, critics and journalists (Zephi Daraki, Kostas G. Papageorgiou, Alexis Stamatis, Spyros Tsaknias and Vangelis Hatzivassileiou).
As the members of the committee explain in the introduction to the volume, they were impressed by the fact that the poetry submitted for the competition appeared to be uninfluenced and to focus on a more or less classical imagery that clings with a charming insistence to the permanent questions of existence and the needs of the other. They found this impressive in an age where technological over -development and a plethora of messages crates a universe full of successive and fleeting images so that whatever is decoded appears momentarily only to be replaced by something new. The work of the young poets selected suggests a fragmented and particularly despairing mental state, since despiteall its intellectualism, it appears deeply experiential. So, undertaking the responsibility and the cost that this incurs, and following in the tracks of genuine grief, it presents this fate with dramatic innocence and in often extraordinary poetic language. The reader is called upon not to delight but to sympathise, as this generation seeks not to be “clever” but to be authentic.
PANAYOTIS IOANNIDIS
THE FEATHER
[..]
for a lily-white gull’s feather on the dusty pebbles
was also the first time you looked at me
and you leaned over me like the rain, that drips colours
on the pebbles and, spot by spot, alters them entirely
so, entirely new, I too shone in your arms
[..]
THEANO KOTINI
SPETSES
Garyfallo Beach
[..]
-how could they still recall
the leaf’s antics
motionless for so many years now
in the building’s stays?-
we smoked our last cigarette
examining the faded grass
this too worn by the sun and unresolved
[..]
KONSTANTINOS KATSOURELIS
SCREEN
[..]
who the guard who the god
that our words weave who dwells
on the other side of the page?
[..]
NATASSA POLYDORA
[..]
how roomy loneliness is, right?
[..]
ASIMINA HASANDRA
AGRIMONIO
[..]
in a crevice between the waves
till you ‘re reached – who knows, when?
by what I love
alphabet of silence
[..]
