Longing

Written by Chryssa Nikolakis

Translated from the Greek by Manolis (Emmanuel Aligizakis)

Narrated by Kristine Doll

Greece

 

I want you like a fallen angel

who reached his Heaven

and drank water from the crystal spring.

I want you like a flower

that discovered the Castalian Spring

in a Jewish desert.

I want you like a lake

that yearns for its escape

to the untraveled ocean

into which to merge.

 

I wish I could become

light wind upon your lips 

to get the kiss of your water

though your pitcher is too small

and how can it quench me?

 

Chryssa Nikolakis was born in Athens. She graduated from the University of Athens with a Master’s  Degree in Theology. Later, she also received a Master’s Degree in Literature from the Hellenic Open University. She also holds a Diploma in Translation and Subtitling (British Council). She has published literary studies in many scientific-theological journals. In 2017 she published her first poetry collection Sea Gate (Ostria). Her stories and poems have been published in anthologies such as Short Story Anthology 2017-2018 (Ostria 2017), Colors of the Soul (Ostria, 2018), 4th Anthology Collection (Dianysma 2017), Calendar 2018 (Vergina), Conversations with Cavafy (Ostria), and Conversations with Kazantzakis (Ostria). She primarily deals with literary criticism about poetry, prose, theater, and fairytales. In April 2019, her first book of fairytales, Boy and the Dragon, was published (Aparsis); it was read in the “Fairies and Dragons” program of Voice of Greece (ERT). Her poems “In Defense of the Marginalized” and “Justified” received honors at the Delphi Pan-Hellenic Poetry Competition (2018 and 2019). Her poem “Redemption Time,” was awarded the 3rd Prize at the 8th World Thematic Competition of Hellenism, (2019). She writes literary reviews for many magazines, such as: FRACTAL, TOVIVLIO.NET, MAXMAG, and AUTHORING MELODIES. In May 2019, she became a member of the Panhellenic Union of Writers (PEL).

 Manolis (Emmanuel Aligizakis) is a Cretan-Canadian poet and author. He’s the most prolific writer-poet of the Greek diaspora with over 70 books published in more than a dozen different countries and in eleven different languages. He was recently appointed an honorary instructor and fellow of the International Arts Academy, and awarded a Master’s for the Arts in Literature. Born in the village of Kolibari on the island of Crete in 1947, he moved with his family at a young age to Thessaloniki and then to Athens, where he received his Bachelor of Arts in Political Sciences from the Panteion University of Athens. He served in the armed forces for two years and emigrated to Vancouver in 1973, where he worked as an iron worker, train laborer, taxi driver, and stock broker, and studied English Literature at Simon Fraser University. He has written three novels and numerous collections of poetry. His articles, poems and short stories in Greek and English have appeared in various magazines and newspapers in Canada, United States, Hungary, Slovakia, Romania, Australia, Jordan, Serbia and Greece. His poetry has been translated in Romanian, Swedish, German, Hungarian, Ukrainian, French, Portuguese, Arabic, Turkish, Serbian, Russian, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, languages and has been published in book form or in magazines in various countries. He lives in White Rock, where he spends his time writing, gardening, traveling, and heading Libros Libertad, an unorthodox and independent publishing company which he founded in 2006 with the mission of publishing literary books. His book of translations entitled George Seferis-Collected Poems was shortlisted for the Greek National Literary Awards, the highest literary recognition in Greece. In September 2017 he was awarded the First Poetry Prize of the Mihai Eminescu International Poetry Festival in Craiova, Romania.