Apostolos Palierekis, Waiting to be Heard
His eighth poetry collection and eleventh book by Apostolos Palierekis, who also has four collections of prose. Seventy-four poems of tight and firmly grounded writing that painfully experience our dystopian era. Apoistolos has long struggled with what happens around and beside us, so he weaves a musical noir poem, like the black-and-white films that portray the dramatic situations of protagonists. But in Palierakis's melodrama, the dominant figure is not the young premier, but the outcast and invisible person, see «Debtor» (p. 28): Near his seventies/ on the seventh step/ from the sidewalk/ of mold, the field/ of the damp room/ the slippery floor/ of the mold/ of the room/ Bed without mattress/ – luckily with legs–/ empty table/ and a crouching chair/ to sit and watch/ passers' legs [...] Years of misery/ life owed him/ He found himself owing/ usurers, tax authorities/ and the social insurance fund.
Perhaps in the same tone, can be read «Dreams of the Times» (p. 46) and «Trauma Trade» [... ] We accept everything/ perhaps with pleasure/ What do we do now?/ at some point we ask/ traders of our traumas/ To buy, hopeless/ mortal remedies/ kissing their hands (p. 47). A. P. deals with the trade of hope, regardless of whether focusing on health issues or social matters, which, like the charity trade (thriving from the economic crisis onward), turns the right to live into the compassion of circles, into charity of economic-political interests, even into supermarket advertisements.
The two mottos he chooses (poetry is a way that helps me pass, as painlessly as possible, the adventure we call the life of Giorgos Markopoulos and the «Imagining» to escape the sick reality of Myrtali Kantartzis) foreshadow the emotional charge emitted by the poet's verses, which in «Image Management» refer to the plausibility of life. See also the poem dedicated to Giorgos Almis, «Without Subverter» (p. 36), where Palierakis accepts: Our common realization and pain/ that nothing exists here. Yet a few lines down, in the same poem, a glimmer of hope begins to emerge with the emphatic, moving repetition of the line «Let's go a little further»: We knew, believed, ran/ Tried, tired, breathe/ Let's go a little further/ The tested unjust, starting with ours/ to the flames of our thoughts/ Let's agree, promise/ Until when will it be utopia/ Let's go a little further.
Here lies the vital function of poetry as protection, salvation, resilience, courage, and hope, so Apostolos Palierekis writes: «I long to put heaven in my verses»! A powerful confession highlighting the healing nature of art in general but also in the painful personal realities each one endures with strength and dignity: Our future is scorched/ The present seeks hope/ Turns to poetry/ To the poetry that rises/ and spreads its feminine wings...(«Feminine Wings of Poetry», p. 14).
Especially notable is the poem «Acrostic and Dream», p. 35. Human but so precise in its lyric view is also the poem on p. 55, «Introversion»: I want, he finally said/ in my courtyard house/ internal, mine/ To carve/ to water/ to enjoy fragrances/ to taste fruits/ The pigeon came/ and pecked at his hat/ Ah, and the postman mumbled/ bringing the first fertilizer.
It's natural to have many poetic poems in this inner dialogue-need of life: see «Acts of Addition and Subtraction», p. 29 and «Poetry Day», p. 34. Poems dedicated to loved ones: to his partner Natasha, to beloved grandchildren («the two synonyms of optimism»), to friends and fellow travelers of literary matters/traumas. Always kindly and with innate politeness, a synonym for his modesty, Palierakis engages in heartfelt and human dialogue with everyone and everything. Feeling grateful for life, nature, friends, art, healers, supporters: The fragrances he brings and takes/ with the dream mediator/ If they stay in your senses/ I ask for little. only one light/ in the pain you shadows./ may his sweetness not oxidize («Acrostic and Dream», p. 35).
And from the poem «Medusa Gorgo and My Shields» (p. 80-82): May your locust tree bloom/ may you be drenched with its aroma/ gather your courage/ until the anemones [... ] And who knows afterwards/ in your circle the unknown/ your unwritten bow/ if it steals from the straight/ as much as you keep open accounts/ with the flowers.
Because when hope exists, the vital process of love also blossoms—even in its deviations and dramas—in the collection we read distinct verses, such as in «Light in the Forest», p. 87, or in «Undemonstrated» (p. 31): That's why I tell you/ I don't question, I fall in love/ I don't comment/ I cry without shame/ unrepentant, and in Odysseus's «Prehistoric Interview» (p. 27) we read: How did you meet/ the passion and extent of love?/ In a pigsty, in the embrace of a witch/ How did you remain alive/ when you stepped on your island?/ By coincidence/ Penelope and not Clytemnestra/ at the edge of the thread.
An endeavor of humanism, resilience, and hope runs through Apostolos Palierekis's poetry. A great gain for both the writer and the reader.
«M»
Apostolos Palierekis was born in Agioi Anargyroi, Attica, in 1943 and hails from Crete. He studied in Thessaloniki and practiced as a Civil Engineer both freelance and as an employee of OSE. His poems and short stories have been published in literary magazines and online platforms. They have also been included in numerous collective editions.
