Poem by Miltos Sachtouris
SAVIOR
I count the fingers of my severed hands
the hours I’ve spent on these windy roofs
I have no other hands, my love, and the doors
don’t close and the dogs are uncompromising.
With my naked legs deep in these dirty waters
with my naked heart I long (not for myself)
for a light-blue window
how have they built so many rooms
so many tragic books
without a shred of light
without a short breath of oxygen
for the sick reader
since each room is but an open wound
how can I descent the tumbled stairs again
among the bog and the wild dogs
to bring medicine and rosy gauzes
and if I find the pharmacy closed
and if I find the pharmacist dead
and if I find my naked heart on the window display of the pharmacy
no, no, it’s all over, there’s no salvation
the rooms will remain as they were
with the wind and its cane fields
with the ruins of glassy moaning faces
with their achroous bleeding
with porcelain hands opened towards me
with the unforgiving forgetfulness
they’ve forgotten my fleshy hands which were severed
as I was measuring their agony
Hellenic Canadian Literature 