Yórgos Markópoulos
From: The Fireworkers (1979)
A Poem Said That It Knew Who Mitsos Was
at the Preveza coach office. Alone and quite calm.
Then he entered Athens, Sunday afternoon,
no fuss, unnoticed, to start his electrician's course.
He went past the closed builders' yards
along the Iera Odos, past broken down trucks, two-stroke vans,
and the locked up factories of Aigaleo.
In the distance Mitsos saw Mount Pendeli, Kerameiko...
So this is Athens, he thought.
Then he crossed Omonia Square, utterly deserted.
There was a lad from his parts, in national service.
He pretended not to recognise him. 'Hey, you! Is that you,
Mitsos!'
And Mitsos answered, 'No',
his mind all confusion,
thoughts of his barefoot childhood
and shaven head — all ears — back home,
and Stella, the girl from Veria he'd fallen in love with,
who ended up married to a livestock merchant from Livadia.
So this is Athens, thought Mitsos again.
That evening he ordered a plate of spaghetti
at a bistro in Veranzerou street — then went for a stroll.
And spent the night at the Hotel 'Beautiful Epirus'
in Menandrou street.
Translated by John C. Davies
Page(s) 107
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