Zacharoula Gaitanaki 

Zacharoula Gaitanaki was born inAthenson November. 30^th, 1966. Now, she is a small farmer and lives with her family in Zoni, a small Arcadian village in Peloponnese. She writes poems, articles, short stories, essays, novels, and review of  book.  She is also a translator  of books of poetry.

She is a life member of the “World Academy of Arts and  Culture”  /  “World Congress of Poets” (which awarded her the title of the Honorary Doctor of Literature) and of the IWA (International Writers Association). She is a member of the “World Poets Society” (WPS) and of the “Asociacion Mundial de Escritores - AME” ofSpain(No. 3299).

Her poems, short stories and essays have appeared  in foreign and Greek Anthologies, they have been translated into English, French, Italian, Albanian, Bengali, Russian, Portuguese, Japanese, Spanish, Chinese, Korean and have won prizes in national and international literary competitions.  She selected by “The International Poetry Translation and Research Centre” and the Journal of “The World Poets Quarterly” one of “The International Best Translators2005”(China, 2006) and by the Greek Literary Club “Xasteron” as “The Best Greek Translator of the year2007”(March, 22, 2008). “Best Poet of the Year2012”by the IPTRC. Best translator of the year 2013 by the IWA.

ΜY VILLAGE’S PARTS

My heart knows

every part of my village.

It has crossed

and loved all of them.

With the laughter, the tear

at the end of my village

I’ll stay gazing out

and courage I’ll take.

With the breeze of my village

I’ll cool the sweltering hot

in the furnace of life

and that freshness will stay.

In the company of that

I will endure what will come.

Every part of my village,

my heart’s sacred mate.

For  you,  my country, I’ll be proud for ever,

I have inside me a deep grief and a fervent wish.

I feel sorry for the glorious past that declines,

I feel sad for the present and the bad that leaves behind.

Your immortal monuments are not covered with dust ,

they are not destroyed by the earthquakes the chill doesn’t bother them.

Sounio, the Acropolis, your ancient theatres, 

sing your glories and your achievements.

            Your green mountains, your beautiful islands, 

your helmets, your temples, your perfect beauty,

they have, my sweet country, the blessing of God,

the eternal light and joy, the perfect harmony.

            Reflections of the sun on your blue waters,

the light of the moon on your holy grounds,

something of the mysteries, attractive, they reflect,

the dreams are like small boats that they are sailing the Aegean Sea.

My Greece, all through I can’t have enough of your light 

and near the waters of your springs I relax a little.

Like a migrant bird I would like to go all over you,

singing, my country.

But my verses are poor to portray you,

they are unable to make the painting of your beauty.

You encourage my soul, you dismiss all of my pains,

walking on my heart’s road, I meet you.

ZONI

My village, you are small, picturesque, hamlet

in the edge of Gortynia.

My eyes fill with tears when I look at you,

I mourn for the devastation

that I see everywhere, when I see your houses,

wandering in your streets.

Your vineyards have become barren,

your olive trees don’t bear fruit

and in your yards flowers do not bloom

in the flower pots.

It was, in the past, the blessed years,

when all your windows were wide open.

Now, my beautiful village, your roads are closed

and a small number of villagers walk in your places.

Bitter memories in my mind

and how can I heal them?

But I wish you, my village Zounati, to come to life again.

To open your houses again, make your yards green

and fill your streets with children’s voices.

SPRING

                            Nature woke up and got dressed

its familiar colors,

air transports myriads scents,

fragrances of the flowers’

sun is playing on the earth.

Everywhere is the wisdom of God

and people fall silent.

        THE POETS  

                                               Poets do not struggle

with bullets and knives,

they write verses, sing

and extend their hands.

They yield in inspiration

in the hours of loneliness,

they count with verses and strophes

fine weathers and storms.

Poets do not love

simply for love.

They write verses for naked bodies

before they touch them.

They are absorbed by love and swim

in love’s depths

and after, they write poems

for “the moment” that is lost…

                MY SOLITUDE

               I captured my solitude on a large sheet of paper.

Afterwards, I held it in my hands and I began to cut it into small pieces,

until all the paper became a great number of pieces thrown on the floor.

I pile them up and I set a fire.

      I opened the window.

I took the ashes and scattered them out on the road.

Closing the shutters, I saw my solitude to spread on the side

walk her overcoat to spend the night.

    In the morning, it will knock on my door again.

                            As every day….

                A  WISH

                            Inside me a grief fades away,

a heartbreak flickers,

as my dream’s light

shades leaves behind it.

It is dawning

in the poor heart’s aching shoulders,

my worries  took

foreign streets.

And in the dawn of the New Year

I anticipate the LOVE

to  crown victors

the laughter and the teardrop.

            POETRY’S MATERIALS

                            A well – dressed verse

with a red, full of freshness

and fragrance carnation on the lapel

pops out right

in the crown to dance.

Two strophes start a feast

on the white paper.

On top, an underlined title

assigns the intention of the poem.

Rhymes, words, “moments”

are valuable and invaluable

materials for a Poet

to make an emotion,

to pay off a debt

         A  CRACK

                   Shades that mark the corners

and whatever has remained

don’t become you.

Look up,

give wings in your look

to fly on the uppermost.

Wherever leads you the heart,

in any harbor and arms

anchor and rest.

When you will see a crack,

go there to get

near your dreams.

   UNFORTIFIED  SOUL

                   I surrender my soul,

to you reader,

imprinted

on the whiteness of paper,

unfortified.

Every page on unguarded door.

Words, lines, verses,

my ammunition.

I bow with lightening dismantled

in front of you reader.

Indulgence I don’t beg for

and hostage at last

I let out myself

in your judgment.

FATHERLAND

                            For many years now,

he regards the foreign country

his second home.

But in his heart,

an eternal love

nests forGreece.

A handful of the native soil, 

a small branch of lemon tree

and a seashell fromAegean Sea

antidotes of forgetting.

Besides the icons he keeps,

 in a small box,

 the soil, the seashell, the flowers,

mementos from his fatherland.

SPACE OF DREAMS

The unnecessary found

its place nowadays.

We live the not essential every day.

Contemporary man finds

the only refuge

in the space of dreams.

There, he surrenders in wonderful,

inexpressible things

and ephemeral creations.

Nowadays: DEFEND with dreams.

OPPOSE to baseness.

WORRY for hearts

ceased flourishing.

            MOMENTS OF LIFE

                            Our soul pass

on impassable roads.

Our body looks for

the “light” of pleasure.

The wind does not blow

for a faraway voyage.

Every hour brings forth

what we don’t want.

Corners full of shadows

in the narrow streets

of the world.

Painful hearts

and nowhere hope.

Our life, a boat

with the sails set

that didn’t weigh anchor.

And hangs around our soul

in paths of dreams,

in unexplored places

and other heavens.

                            A SUMMER’S LOVE

                            In the middle of the summer

her heart yields from Love.

This is something unexpected.

She wished: “It will go soon,

it will disappear”.

She closed her eyes wishing good – bye

to the August etesian winds.

Autumn came and love stays yet

in the same place.

“Come” beckons her.

“Follow me. Trust me”.

Yields her heart light,

cheated out of lust and sweetness.

“Until you leave” she thought,

“I want to live with my dream”.

And she followed tile tracks

that her yearning leaves

behind on the seashore

of the temporary happiness…

        SOUNIO

                                               I  still remember

that August afternoon at Sounio.

The waves to engrave the reef,

tourists taking photographs

of the eternal marbles of the temple,

the breeze mixing up our hair.

Love playing hide and seek

between the columns

and our the gaze

absorbing by endless blue.

A summer remembrance

–       of a transient love -

an August afternoon at Sounio.

           BLUE

                               A piece of sky

I brought down

to offer you, my darling,

to play and forget.

FromAegean Sea

I brushed away the blue

with the piece of sky

to match.

To hold both in your hands,

to play and forget.

You don’t know what it means

to love but not be loved.

FATHERLAND

                            For many years now,

he regards the foreign country

his second home.

But in his heart,

an eternal love

nests forGreece.

A handful of the native soil, 

a small branch of lemon tree

and a seashell fromAegean Sea

antidotes of forgetting.

Besides the icons he keeps,

 in a small box,

 the soil, the seashell, the flowers,

mementos from his fatherland.

                                      ZACHAROULA GAITANAKI ------------

SPACE OF DREAMS

The unnecessary found

its place nowadays.

We live the not essential every day.

Contemporary man finds

the only refuge

in the space of dreams.

There, he surrenders in wonderful,

inexpressible things

and ephemeral creations.

Nowadays: DEFEND with dreams.

OPPOSE to baseness.

WORRY for hearts

ceased flourishing.

© ZACHAROULA GAITANAKI, Greece

She has published the books: 

1.-  “DISSIMILAR  LANDSCAPES” (Poetry collection),Athens, 2001.

2.-   “POTIS KATRAKIS, A PROLIFIC  WRITER” (Essay), Athens 2003.

3.-  “STATHIS  GRIVAS – WRITING FOR LIFE  - Tracking in his poetical space”  

       (Essay), editions “Platanos”,Athens, 2006.    

4.- «200 YEARS ZONI (1810 - 2010)», a special edition (with 59 photos),

      “Morfotikos Exoraistikos Syllogos Zonis ofArcadia”,  2010

5.- “POTIS KATRAKIS – ROUTE TO CREATION”, (Essay), Athens 2012,

      Editions “Lexitipon”.

e- mail:  zgaitanaki@yahoo.gr

You can visit her web sites:    http://homepages.pathfinder.gr/poiitikigonia

http://douridasliterature.com/PoetryArkadia.html   www.zounati.wordpress.com

www.apostaktirio.gr/ Βιογραφικά Λογοτεχνών

www.google.com/ZacharoulaGaitanaki