On Maenalo, Sunday 20.3.2016 Poem by dimitrios galanis

The course was for the highest of the three summits,
'the blissful stones...
the self-built - freedom's - bastions' *
of independence and resistance. *

Gentle, the northern trail gives you the convenience
not to be afraid neither of ''fury nor of rage divine''.**
Without bells, bleating and barking anymore,
there was not to be heard any Pan's yell. ***

Smooth, the crispy sound
from the leftover snow's crystals
which fracture the steps, beside the footprints
of hares, foxes and wild boars.
Light -as through obstacles- the fall
of the iced candles that tear away from the spruce firs.
Its sounds a pleasant company.

To not get quickly tired from the ascent on the steep slope,
you stand every now 'nd then to reciprocate the smile
to solitary blooms or clusters of irises, anemones and crocuses
that, without any awe near the still persistently white neighbour,
hurried up to wear their blooming dress.
To the appeal of its fragrance, the insects were already present.
You do not need bend down.Slits in rocks tall, left or right,
host many of them, accessible to your nostrils to enjoy it too.

Suddenly you hear the chirping of partridges on the summits
and you prepare yourself for any fortuitous sonorous encounter.
Υou do not rush in.
Within a while you are yourself there too.

You flip your look all around.
Further and further it goes
and you wonder about distances and their horizons.
There, high up, you sense the hamble feeling that,
rammed into familiar, trivial, short-sighted concerns,
you had not counted rightly sizes in life,
always in relation to their perspectives.

...............
*Words of Th.Kolokotronis[leader of revolution against Turks] for his bastions there before the liberation of Tripolis in the war of independence.
- during the resistance against nazis partisans were sheltered there too
[between them my father in-law]
** the meaning of the word Maenalo[=fure, rage divine].
*** the main home place in Arcadia for Pan was Maenalo