Expectation

Agnes Sotiracopoulou – Skina

A pack of mad wolves
My sensations have slavering pursued me
Since early dawn,
They fall upon me, they bite me,
They hurt me,
And I, lying motionless
Without volition
Upon a bed
That I cannot lift my body from,
Here with dry eye-balls
In the empty sockets of my eyes,
I am waiting for them to devour me.
Fire seizes the extremities of my body.
My joints groan, I am withering
Ashes–everything beautiful that ever existed­–
My own body ashes!
And I cannot even scream...

CLAY

I hate my nights­
Terrible nights of horrible deflected loves;
Full of indescribably lascivious dreams,
And then, the awakenings.

The fearful disappointment, the ghastly abyss,
This inviolable grave
From which, even with imagination’s help,
I cannot escape.

Fear paralyses me;
I want to get away–but where to go?
For the whole world turns to clay­–
And I a blind worm searching
To find life’s spark once more within it.

–Translated from the Greek by the author and Hugh McKinley