by K. P. Kavafis
Translated by A. Moskios
You said: 'I will go to another land, go to another sea,
I will find another city much better than this.
Every effort of mine an unbounded failure it is
And my heart - dead - and buried is.
For how long my mind can stay in a rot like this?
Everywhere my eyes turn, every where I see,
Black ruins of my life are the sights I see,
Of years past which spoiled it and ruined it.'
Other lands you will not find, you will find no other seas.
This city your firm companion is. you'll walk forever down
In the same parts of town, turn old in the same shabby town:
In these same city homes you will gray now turn.
Always in this city you will end. Hope not and do not yearn.
There is no ship for you, there is no street.
The way you messed your life and became a misfit
In this small corner, in this whole earth you ruined it.