Joseph S. Josephides

Why, State, your eyes don’t see the Amazon River?
Tsiko said 'Amazon is life' and you agreed to save it.
Why the horsemen of interests invaded in the night?
Their bullet entered Tsiko’s chest but invades your own.

You cry as a crocodile, but tomorrow as a coward.

The pheasant of our forest sings dirges for our hero
Tsiko Mentez, same with the seal of Skiathos
that was wailing for the girl who fell in the sea.
We, his friends, are laughing in this jail you threw us
we set free a donkey in the square with a picket
declaring: “I don’t surrender”. Our voice is it,
the voice of the River, our tears and our sweat,
his roaring and his foam.

Thousands of trees, we stand mad but still, in his place.
If you cut us off you will to see us horizontal barriers
closing your way forward; your bullet in our trunk
opens a hole; it is the exit for the resin,
which we make wine and we drink in your health,
while birds and animals sing psalms to their Source.



© JosephJosephides