54713 - The mandolin of memory

N. Lygeros
Translated from the Greek by Athina Kehagias

Upon returning home, he saw the mandolin that his friend he had buried at the Marais des Cygnes had given him.
He looked at it differently.
He gave another meaning to the fretboard.
Upon each fret, he engraved with his remembrance the names of his dead comrades for the human rights.
He was happy because there were marks upon five frets.
At the last one he placed his friend.
He held the hearts that he would touch with his feather, so that they may live inside him.
It was then that a favorite song which accompanied the mandolin came to mind .
That’s how he decided to play for his own people, while he was watching the fireplace.
The mandolin seemed more robust, as if their souls had given it clout .
He played the song but without singing.
He remained silent in order to hear every note of the old song as they would later refer to it.
But then, it was the music of the epoch, and he did not want to forget it.
He realized that only his mandolin had the ability to perceive the way he felt.
He began to play cyclically, as tradition required, but when he remembered the scene, he continued policyclically in order to incorporate new thoughts into the memory, and the mandolin followed, armed twice, with a sharp note which reminded him of the wooden crosses he had placed upon the improvised graves.
When he finished, he kissed the mandolin’s head over the keys. That is where there was the upper lip of an invisible smile.