The Garbi was whipping up the waves.
we were bending, the two of us, over the map;
you turned and said to me that by March
you would have entered different latitudes.
On your chest [there is] a coolie's tattoo,
that, however much you burn it, does not think of disappearing.
They say that you have loved her [once]
during an attack of black fever.
On watch beside a bald headland
and the Southern Cross [overhead] among the spars.
You clutch a Komboloi made of coral
and tirelessly chew bitter coffee beans.
Alpha Centauri, one night
with the astrolabe , I pulled it down.
you spoke to me in a deathly voice
beware the stars of the South
Sometime, once, under that same sky
you spent three months in a row
with the captain's half-caste [woman]
[taking] every night a lesson in steering a true course.
In a trade post in Nossi Bé
you pulled out two shillings for that knife,
one day, at noon, on the Line,
[when it was] flashing like a lit-up lighthouse
Down there on the shores of Africa
The years pass by now that you are asleep
The beacons, you don't remember them no longer,
nor the lovely Sunday sweet.
The Southern Cross
Artist: Nikos Kavvadias
Featuring artist: Thanos Mikroutsikos, Aimilia Sarri