Nikos Gatsos : Rosewater

 

 

When you reach that other world, don't become a cloud,

don't become a cloud, and the bitter star of dawn,

so that your mother knows you, waiting at her door.

Take a wand of willow, a root of rosemary,

a root of rosemary, and be a moonlit coolness

falling in the midnight in your thirsting courtyard.

I gave you rosewater to drink, you gave me poison,

eaglet of the frost, hawk of the desert.

 

 

— translated from the Modern Greek by Jon Corelis