Angelos Sikelianos ( 1884- 1951)Greek: Άγγελος Σικελιανός
I. (First singer)
As I threw the final torch into the hearth,
(Torch of my life closed in time),
Into the hearth of your new freedom, Greece !
My soul suddenly lit up as if All space were copper or as if
The holy cell of Herakleitos were around me,
Where, for years,
He forged his thoughts on Eternity
And hung them like weapons
In the Temple of Ephesus. . .
II. (Second singer)
Gigantic thoughts,
Like clouds of fire or islands of purple
In a mythical sunset,
Lit up in my mind,
Suddenly my whole life flared up
In concern for your new freedom, Greece !
So I did not say:
This is the light of my funeral pyre…
I said, I am the torch of your history,
So let my abandoned body burn like a torch. With this torch
Marching upright, as at the final hour
I shall light up every corner of the Universe,
I shall open the road to the soul,
To the spirit, to your body, Greece.
I spoke and went forward
Holding my burning liver
On your Caucasus,
Every step of mine
Was the first, and was, I thought, the last.
My naked foot trod in your blood,
My naked foot brushed against your bodies,
For my body, my face, my entire spirit
Was mirrored, as in a lake, in your blood.
There, in such a scarlet mirror, Greece
A bottomless mirror, a mirror of abyss
Of your freedom and your thirst,. I saw myself
Moulded out of heavy red clay
A new Adam of the newest creation
That we plan to create for you, Greece.
III. (Third singer)
And I said:
I know it, yes I know that your gods
The Olympians have become. an earthly foundation
For we have buried them deep, lest foreigners find them.
The foundations have been strengthened twice and thrice
With the bones our enemies have buried above…
And I know that for libations and vows
For the new Temple we have dreamt for you, Greece
Days and nights more brothers have killed each other
Than lambs slaughtered for Easter…
IV. (First singer)
Fate and your Fate is mine threefold
And from Love, the great creator Love
Now that my soul has hardened and penetrates
Right into the mud and on to your blood to mould
Today I call with it to all comrades:
V. (Second singer and choir)
»Forward: Help us raise the sun over Greece
Forward: Help us raise the sun over the whole world.
Look, its wheel is deeply stuck in the mud,
Look, its axle is deeply sunk in the blood.
Forward lads, the sun cannot rise alone
Push with knee and chest to get it out of the mud
Push with chest and knee to get it out of the blood.
Look how we blood brothers lean upon it
Forward brothers, it has surrounded us by fire
Forward, forward, its flame has engulfed us.
VI. (First singer)
Forward creators. . .Your burdened thrust
Support with heads and feet lest the sun sink.
Help me as well brothers, lest I sink too.
It is already on me, in me and around me,
I have been turning in a sacred dizziness with it.
The cruppers of a thousand bulls hold its base
A two-headed eagle above me
Shakes its wings and its scream
Resounds in my head and in my soul,
The far and near are one for me
Unheard heavy harmonies surround me.
Forward comrades, help raise the sun
So that it may become a spirit.
VII. (Second singer and choir)
The new Word approaches. It will colour everything
In its new flame, mind and body, pure steel.
Our earth has had enough human flesh
Fat and fertile, we must not let our soil
Dry up after the heavy blood bath
Richer and deeper than any first rains.
Tomorrow all must go out with twelve pairs of oxen
And plough this blood-drenched land.
The laurel must blossom and become the tree of life
Our vine must spread to the ends of the Universe.
Forward lads, the sun cannot rise alone
Push with knee and chest to get it out of the mud
Push with chest and knee to get it out of the blood
Push with hands and heads that the sun may shine on the Spirit.
VIII. (First singer)
Thus as I threw the final torch into the hearth
(Torch of my life closed in time),
Into the hearth of your new freedom, Greece.
Suddenly my cry was strongly raised, as if
All space were copper, or as if
The holy cel1 of Herakleitos were around me,
Where, for years,
He forged his thoughts on Eternity
And hung them like weapons
In the Temple of Ephesus…
Just as I cried to you, comrades !
As I threw the final torch into the hearth,
(Torch of my life closed in time),
Into the hearth of your new freedom, Greece !
My soul suddenly lit up as if All space were copper or as if
The holy cell of Herakleitos were around me,
Where, for years,
He forged his thoughts on Eternity
And hung them like weapons
In the Temple of Ephesus. . .
II. (Second singer)
Gigantic thoughts,
Like clouds of fire or islands of purple
In a mythical sunset,
Lit up in my mind,
Suddenly my whole life flared up
In concern for your new freedom, Greece !
So I did not say:
This is the light of my funeral pyre…
I said, I am the torch of your history,
So let my abandoned body burn like a torch. With this torch
Marching upright, as at the final hour
I shall light up every corner of the Universe,
I shall open the road to the soul,
To the spirit, to your body, Greece.
I spoke and went forward
Holding my burning liver
On your Caucasus,
Every step of mine
Was the first, and was, I thought, the last.
My naked foot trod in your blood,
My naked foot brushed against your bodies,
For my body, my face, my entire spirit
Was mirrored, as in a lake, in your blood.
There, in such a scarlet mirror, Greece
A bottomless mirror, a mirror of abyss
Of your freedom and your thirst,. I saw myself
Moulded out of heavy red clay
A new Adam of the newest creation
That we plan to create for you, Greece.
III. (Third singer)
And I said:
I know it, yes I know that your gods
The Olympians have become. an earthly foundation
For we have buried them deep, lest foreigners find them.
The foundations have been strengthened twice and thrice
With the bones our enemies have buried above…
And I know that for libations and vows
For the new Temple we have dreamt for you, Greece
Days and nights more brothers have killed each other
Than lambs slaughtered for Easter…
IV. (First singer)
Fate and your Fate is mine threefold
And from Love, the great creator Love
Now that my soul has hardened and penetrates
Right into the mud and on to your blood to mould
Today I call with it to all comrades:
V. (Second singer and choir)
»Forward: Help us raise the sun over Greece
Forward: Help us raise the sun over the whole world.
Look, its wheel is deeply stuck in the mud,
Look, its axle is deeply sunk in the blood.
Forward lads, the sun cannot rise alone
Push with knee and chest to get it out of the mud
Push with chest and knee to get it out of the blood.
Look how we blood brothers lean upon it
Forward brothers, it has surrounded us by fire
Forward, forward, its flame has engulfed us.
VI. (First singer)
Forward creators. . .Your burdened thrust
Support with heads and feet lest the sun sink.
Help me as well brothers, lest I sink too.
It is already on me, in me and around me,
I have been turning in a sacred dizziness with it.
The cruppers of a thousand bulls hold its base
A two-headed eagle above me
Shakes its wings and its scream
Resounds in my head and in my soul,
The far and near are one for me
Unheard heavy harmonies surround me.
Forward comrades, help raise the sun
So that it may become a spirit.
VII. (Second singer and choir)
The new Word approaches. It will colour everything
In its new flame, mind and body, pure steel.
Our earth has had enough human flesh
Fat and fertile, we must not let our soil
Dry up after the heavy blood bath
Richer and deeper than any first rains.
Tomorrow all must go out with twelve pairs of oxen
And plough this blood-drenched land.
The laurel must blossom and become the tree of life
Our vine must spread to the ends of the Universe.
Forward lads, the sun cannot rise alone
Push with knee and chest to get it out of the mud
Push with chest and knee to get it out of the blood
Push with hands and heads that the sun may shine on the Spirit.
VIII. (First singer)
Thus as I threw the final torch into the hearth
(Torch of my life closed in time),
Into the hearth of your new freedom, Greece.
Suddenly my cry was strongly raised, as if
All space were copper, or as if
The holy cel1 of Herakleitos were around me,
Where, for years,
He forged his thoughts on Eternity
And hung them like weapons
In the Temple of Ephesus…
Just as I cried to you, comrades !
Excerpt of "Journals of Resistance", pp.252-254 © Flammarion 1971, © Theodorakis 1996 - English translation by © Hart-Davis MacGibbon Ltd.
Míkis Theodorákis en grec : Μίκης Θεοδωράκης http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%ADkis_Theodor%C3%A1kis