NOSTALGIA FOR FLUTE IN THE CHERRY GARDEN

Your hair is the night’s notion
I’ll tell you half the truth again,
light will spring where you came, let
the stars burn, passion is not spent,

nor the music’s silver on the grass;
nothing will change, images, colours, half-words
it will be as if you came back to the same stripped place
with its red pines, the moon at the road’s edge

the half-burnt houses not touching the ground
the dust a book, the breeze a dark opera —
let the animals come near you, quietly

nature wants to enter your sleep
and if it rains, we have strong dreams
our name is created from diamonds.

(Translated by Simon Darragh, Agenda, Greek poetry –new voices and Ancient Echoes, guest editor: David Connolly, vol.36 Nos. 3-4, spring 1999)