Poetry by Yannis Patilis
Translated by Aristi Trendel
IMAGES FROM A YOUNG WOMAN, LIKE HAIKU, 2015
γ΄
Every word of yours
One more hand upon me
Softly caressing
δ΄
Bites of darkness
I cram into my mouth
Your black hair
ε΄
My mad mouth,
Come on then, speak now
In two tongues
στ΄
Over the clothes
I touch her small breast
and it knows
ζ΄
Her breast in your palm
You won’t drink for a long time
Out of a glass
η΄
A new miracle
Your nipple grows egg-hard
In my fingers
Ιζ΄
Before you there ought to be
A minute of silence
To all words
Original Poem
ΕΙΚΟΝΕΣ ΑΠΟ ΜΙΑ ΝΕΑ ΣΑΝ ΧΑΙ-ΚΟΥ, 2015
γ΄
Κάθε σου λέξη
Ἕνα ακόμα σου χέρι
Ποὺ με χαϊδεύει
δ΄
Μπουκιές σκοτάδι
Στὸ στόμα μου χώνω τὰ
Μαύρα μαλλιά σου
ε΄
Τρελλό μου στόμα
Ἄντε μίλησε τώρα
Μὲ δύο γλώσσες
στ΄
Πάνω ἀπὸ ροῦχα
Μικρὸ βυζάκι ἀκουμπῶ
Κι αὐτὸ τὸ ξέρει
ζ΄
Στὴ χούφτα βυζί
Καιρὸ θὰ κάνεις νὰ πιεῖς
Ἀπὸ ποτήρι
η΄
Καινούργιο θαῦμα
Ἡ ρόγα σου αὐγαταίνει
Στὰ δάχτυλά μου
ιζ΄
Μπροστά σου πρέπει
Ἑνὸς λεπτoῦ σιγή
Σὲ ὅλες τὶς λέξεις
Yiannis Patilis (Athens, 1947) belongs to the Greek “Generation of the 70s,” the term used by Greek scholarship for authors who began publishing during that decade. He studied Law and Modern Greek Literature at the University of Athens and worked as a teacher in secondary education. From 1986 to 2012, he was the founder and editor of Planodion, a journal of literature, politics, and culture. Since 2010, he has been the founder and editor of the online magazine Planodion Bonsai Stories, dedicated to flash fiction. He has published ten poetry collections and three volumes of collected poems, most recently The Broken is the Most Resistant: Poems 1970–2024 (Ypsilon Books, Athens, 2023). His work has been translated into several languages, including English (Camel of Darkness: Selected Poems, translated by Stathis Gourgouris, Quarterly Review of Literature, Princeton, 1997) and Spanish (Lo Roto Es Más Persistente, translated by Antonio José Moreno Jurado, Renacimiento, 2018).
Aristi Trendel is a native Greek speaker and a translingual writer. She is Professor of American Studies at Le Mans University, France. She has edited collective volumes, published book chapters, and articles on American writers in American and European journals (The John Updike Review, Philip Roth Studies, The European Journal of American Studies, The Psychoanalytic Review….), the monograph Pedagogic Encounters: Master and Disciple in the American Novel After the 1980s (Bloomsbury, 2021) as well as book reviews and fiction in literary magazines in English, Greek, and French. She is the author of six books of fiction. Her most recent collection of poetry, Prayer to Saint Rita, was published in Greece in 2025 (AΩ Publishers). Forthcoming books: a co-edited volume, The American Dream in the 21st Century: A Transcultural Perspective, Bloomsbury Academic 2027; My Sister’s Baby and Other Stories, Athens: Perispomeni, 2026; Vanitas, bilingual poetry collection, Athens: Perispomeni 2027.
