Interpretation of “I will die on a mournful...” by Kostas Ouranis
Kostas Ouranis was a 20th century poet whom I discovered through the music of the Diafana Krina band. The poem I have selected to comment on is beautiful in its own right, while the musicians have done an excellent job expressing its aesthetics through sound: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgt0vWsXdp0.
What follows is the original work in Greek, my faithful English translation, and subsequent philosophical commentary.
Ερμηνεία: Διάφανα Κρίνα
Μουσική: Διάφανα Κρίνα
Στίχοι: Κώστας Ουράνης
Θα πεθάνω ένα πένθιμο του φθινόπωρου δείλι
μες την κρύα μου κάμαρα όπως έζησα μόνος
Στη στερνή αγωνία μου τη βροχή θε ν' ακούω
και τους γνώριμους θόρυβους που σκορπάει ο δρόμος
Θα πεθάνω ένα πένθιμο του φθινόπωρου δείλι
μέσα σ' έπιπλα ξένα και σε σκόρπια βιβλία
Θα με βρουν στο κρεβάτι μου, θε να 'ρθει ο αστυνόμος
Θα με θάψουν σαν άνθρωπο που δεν είχε ιστορία
Απ' τους φίλους που παίζαμε πότε πότε χαρτιά
θα ρωτήσει κανένας τους έτσι απλά: «Τον Ουράνη
μην τον είδε κανείς; Έχει μέρες που χάθηκε…»
Θ' απαντήσει άλλος παίζοντας: «Μ' αυτός έχει πεθάνει!»
Μια στιγμή θ' απομείνουνε τα χαρτιά τους κρατώντας
θα κουνήσουν περίλυπα και σιγά το κεφάλι
Θε να πουν: «Τι 'ναι ο άνθρωπος! Χθες ακόμα εζούσε…»
και βουβοί στο παιχνίδι τους θα βαλθούνε και πάλι
Κάποιος θα 'ναι συνάδελφος στα «ψιλά» που θα γράψει
πως «προώρως απέθανεν ο Ουράνης στην ξένην
νέος γνωστός εις τους κύκλους μας, κάποτε είχε εκδώσει
μια συλλογή ποιήματα πολλά υποσχομένην»
Κι αυτή θα 'ναι η μόνη του θανάτου μου μνεία
Στο χωριό μου θα κλάψουνε μόνο οι γέροι γονιοί μου
και θα κάνουν μνημόσυνο με περίσσιους παπάδες
όπου θα' ναι όλοι οι φίλοι μου κι ίσως ίσως οι οχτροί μου
Θα πεθάνω ένα πένθιμο του φθινόπωρου δείλι
σε μια κάμαρα ξένη, στο πολύβοο Παρίσι
Και μια Καίτη θαρρώντας πως την ξέχασα γι' άλλην
θα μου γράψει ένα γράμμα και νεκρό θα με βρίσει
Performance: Diafana Krina
Lyrics: Diafana Krina
Music: Kostas Ouranis
I will die on a mournful autumn evening
in my cold room where I lived alone
In my final agony I will be listening to the rain
and the familiar noises that the road disperses
I will die on a mournful autumn evening
amidst foreign furniture and scattered books
They will find me in my bed, the police officer will arrive
They will bury me like a human who had no history
From the friends with whom we sometimes played cards
one will just ask so simply: "Did anyone see Ouranis;
it has been days since he disappeared..."
Another will respond while playing: "But he has died!"
For a moment they pause while holding their cards
They will sorrowfully and slowly nod their heads
They will say: "What is human! He was living yesterday!"
And silently they will resume their game
One of them will be a colleague who will write in the papers
that "Ouranis died prematurely abroad,
well-known in our circles, who once published
a highly promising collection of poems"
And that will be my death's sole reference
At my village only my elderly parents will cry
and they will do a memorial with excess priests
where all my friends will be there and maybe my enemies too
I will die on a mournful autumn evening
in an alien room in boisterous Paris
And a Kate thinking I forsake her for another woman
will write me a letter and curse me while I am dead
The poet tells us indirectly what loneliness feels like in terms of its results. While alive, the poetic “I”, which we may associate with Kostas Ouranis himself, experiences things day-by-day as a stranger to their environment. The room is cold and foreign, his fellow card-playing mates barely notice his absence, while this vaguely romantic figure of Kate does not even know the person is already dead.
The loneliness is further expressed in the distance of the first person from its ancestral land. The village is no Paris and there is no fondness about life in that rural world. Instead, there is a sense of bitterness as the author remarks that nobody will be sad beside the elderly parents yet they will all spend lavishly on extra priests to show how much they really care.
The protagonist dies in the French capital, which is described as boisterous. Therein lies the essence of loneliness: it is the feeling of emptiness amid people. It thus is not the same as solitude, which does not necessarily entail any feeling of dread.
The lonely person is disempowered by the lack of meaningful, profound connections in their life. As with their affair with Kate, relations are kept at a surface level: they are casual, almost formal and business-like, leaving the person depleted, demotivated, and jaded. They are tired as they keep engaging with people yet cannot find this elusive quality they are after. Hence the dread of socialising further and subsequent withdrawal.
It does not matter that the person is a well-known intellectual. They are not gaining anything out of the popularity they have. Perhaps all this attention works to their detriment, as in the public eye they are reduced to the single thing they are known for: “Ouranis? Oh, the poet, right…” This is what kills the person from the inside.
The person caught in this dynamic has difficulty bonding with others, because they feel that others do not care about their intangible qualities of personhood. They will have trust issues, such as “are they my friend because of who I am despite my name or because I am a respected member of the intelligentsia?”
Each case depends on the specific factors at play. Some of it comes down to the circumstances, while there is also something to be said about the attitude of the individual. I think there are moments when we get absorbed in our little world and forget that we too are not connecting with others and are just imagining things about them.
There is a chance that the person is overthinking it, as the poet does here where he assumes his friends back at the village are hypocrites. Are they really that bad or has the author not tried to get to know them better?
It is easy for us to fall in the trap of our own mind, where we think we know more than we do. This is especially true for other people’s motives: they are hard to identify, while appearances are often misleading. Someone who is quick to reach conclusions and to weave elaborate scenaria therefrom is prone to loneliness.
I think such a person can learn to manage their propensity for getting into stressful imaginary worlds. It can be done by learning to gradually cease control—and the will for control—over the particularities of one’s own quotidian experiences. The poetic “I” and everyone in their place must try to engage with strangers in earnest, explore unknown lands, and generally challenge every assumption about the quality of people.
Given that is is already night time here at the hut, I am inspired by my environment to compose this poem:
In your loneliest nights
the crickets
will provide you with
a sense of perspective
[ All my poems are here: https://protesilaos.com/poems/ ]
Just as we can think of our self as alone in the universe, we can also take a step back to notice that, actually, there is a lot going on out there that we do not really pay attention to. What if those supposed enemies back home are nothing of the sort and we misunderstood them? What if we gave Kate the chance to come closer to us? Would she then not be more informed and thus considerate in her letters?
The experience of loneliness is generally debilitating though I think it can be turned into a force for creativity. The individual may realise how their attitude is too narrow in its outlook, presumptuous in its negativity, and ultimately biased against others. Perhaps, then, the crickets and the immanent life of this cosmos will serve as a reminder that we should not be too quick to judge that which we are oblivious to.
Closing with another poem that just came to mind:
When darkness besets you, fear it not
It is but an invitation
to perform a leap of faith
into a whole new world of possibilities