Poem by Nikiforos Vrettakos PΟΔΟΝ ΤΟ ΑΜΑΡΑΝΤΟΝ: translation help

[Theseus]

This is the text:

Ἀπὸ νερὸ κι' ἀπὸ χῶμα εἶν' οἱ λέξεις μου, ζυμωμένες
μὲ μπόλικον ἥλιο, μὲ μπόλικη ἀγάπη.
Ὅλες μου οἱ δύσες μὲ βρίσκουν νὰ κοιτάζω τόν οὐρανό μέ λάσπες στά δάχτυλα.
Χτίζω τὴν πολιτεία μὲ τὸ χαμόγελο.
Χτίζω τὴν πολιτεία μὲ τὴν καρδιά.
Χτίζω τὴν πολιτεία μὲ τὰ παιδιά ποὺ θὰ ’ναι ὅλα δικά σου.
Ποὺ ὅταν νυχτώνει θὰ τοὺς πιάνεις τὸ σφυγμὸ καὶ θὰ τὰ νοιάζεσαι.
Ποὺ τὴν αὐγὴ θὰ τοὺς φορεῖς τὰ τριανταφυλλένια τους
καὶ βγάζοντάς τα στὴ σειρά, κάτω ἀπ’ τὰ χελιδόνια,
θὰ τὰ πηγαίνεις στὸ ποτάμι ποὺ θὰ τρέχει ὁ ἥλιος.


This is my attempt at translation for some friends who sent it from Tinos for me to translate. This is how I fared ( the things I am not sure about are in bold type):-


My words are made of water and soil, kneaded
with much sun, with much love.
All my sunsets find me looking at the sky with muddy fingers.
I build the state with a smile.
I build the state with my heart.
I build the state with the children all of whom will be yours.
That when night falls you will take their pulse and care for them.
At dawn you will bear their things soft as rose petals
and washing them in a row, under the swallows,
you will take them to the river where the sun will run.

Can any colleague suggest improvements to these and indeed any other lines.

 

[daeman]

Ποὺ τὴν αὐγὴ θὰ τοὺς φορεῖς τὰ τριανταφυλλένια τους
καὶ βγάζοντάς τα στὴ σειρά,
...
At dawn you will bear their things soft as rose petals
and washing them in a row,

At dawn you will dress them with their rosy attire
and leading them in a row,

Imagine a duck with her ducklings in a row.

 

[Theseus]

Thanks so much, ‘Man, for your corrections. This poem is a welcome break from aircraft labelling and technical terms!

 

[Earion]

Politeia here is simply the city (preferably a bright, impressive, attractive one, a space enviable for the life one can lead there).

 

[Theseus]

Thanks, Earion. Rather like the traditional Athenian polis. Aristotle’s, perhaps misunderstood statement, a version of which he gives three times. Here is his statement in the Politica: 1, 1253a:- ….. “therefore it is clear that the city-state is a natural growth, and that man is by nature a political animal, and a man that is by nature and not merely by fortune cityless is either low in the scale of humanity or above it （like the “ clanless, lawless, hearthless” man, reviled by Homer, for one by nature unsocial is also ‘a lover of war’ inasmuch as he is solitary, like an isolated piece at draughts. And why man is a political animal in a greater measure than any bee or any gregarious animal is clear. For nature, as we declare, does nothing without purpose; and man alone of the animals possesses speech”.
I think that Aristotle means that a human being is one that lives in a polis, a city state, i.e. a social creature. Perhaps it is fitting to point out, as C.S. Lewis does that all the great tyrants and conquerors have been monotonously the same: but the saints gloriously different. There are exceptions, of course, like Alexander the Great and Napoleon but look at the tyrants of today. And the above quotation about the ‘clanless, lawless, hearthless man’ and ‘a lover of war‘ is worth pondering on!

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