1
- I AM EUROPEAN
I am European, I am European and I have two ears;
One doesn't listen and the other doesn't heed.
Let the Czech, the Russian and the Pole groan,
Man aches, the sky falls.
Let the Negro, the Greek and the Indian suffer,
What do I care? Let God care.
High up there on mount Hymettus
a secret is hidden
I am European and I have two ears
one only listens to the East
Fascism is again knocking on my door
but I am completely deaf to such knocks
I have a big ear, and another very small
and thus in peace I vintage joy and civilization.
2 - FROM THE SNOWS OF RUSSIA
High up from the snows of Russia
where the north wind blows
the wretched slave awaits for centuries
the coming of the blond race.
Love, songs, and flowers
they send us along with burning words
the others dispatch their marines
at the gulf of Phaliro.
The slaves suffer and sigh
there goes this generation too
They all pledge a Paradise
in nineteen hundred ninety-nine.
3 - THE CONSUMERS' SOCIETY
West, your hearing has been deafened
West, your vision has been blinded
consumers' society, your hearing has been covered
by a heavy tunic, your vision has been covered
your soul is covered.
Smoking ruins your civilization
your words mosquitoes flying over the swamps
of your industrial production
transporting fever, lies, hypocrisy.
Five hundred thousand dead in Indonesia
new concentration camps in Europe
next to the Acropolis prisons
but you can't hear, and you can't see
as you run on the next year's model
with a speed of two hundred miles towards your death.
4 - MY SON
My son is nine years old
Nine winters, nine summers.
We put thunder in his glance
He holds the seas in his two hands
He holds the seas in his two hands
They raised his hands
His back they pinned to the wall
They count the echo of his breath
And they search through his little heart
And they search through his little heart
As if we were living in a Jewish ghetto
Surrounded by beastly German guards
Zatouna nineteen hundred sixty-eight
We go through my third exile
We go through my third exile.
5 - THE MOUNTAINS OF ARCADIA
Oh centuries-old mountains, mountains of Arcadia
proud mountains, unsubdued mountains
honest mountains.
Honour became so dear
so rare honour has become
honour is dead.
A child suffers; that is my child
and I, tied up, look at the pine trees
There isn't any other hope for me
except the trees of these mountains.
Arcadia I: Comment | Arcadia
II | Arcadia III | Arcadia
IV | Arcadia V: March of the
Spirit | Arcadia VI | Arcadia
VII: O Epizon | Arcadia VIII
| Arcadia X | Home