The Sacrifice of a Sister

Mother, all the young men

are leaving far away.

They go to find work —

they are all at the ports.

I too must leave somewhere else,

wherever fate may take me,

since it was God’s will

to make me their protector.

“Where will you leave me, my son,

with three little girls?”

“But that is why I must go, Mother —

I am not searching for palaces.

There is no work here nearby.

Give me all your blessings;

I must go far away

so I can marry off my sisters.”

He searched in every way,

but all his efforts were in vain,

and time kept passing

without a single hope.

The eldest sister

had reached seventeen —

a beautiful dark-haired girl

with long black hair.

Their father had disappeared

in the war of ’40.

They did not know if he had been killed,

but he was gone forever.

Many young men in foreign lands,

who had lost their citizenship,

looked for girls from their homeland

to start a family.

Photographs were sent

by prospective grooms;

they would take a bride without dowry —

whichever girl agreed.

They asked the dark-haired one,

the beautiful Ourania,

if she wished to marry

and make a sacrifice.

“If Ourania accepts,

it lies in her own hands

to save us all

from this misery.”

“Where will you send me, Mother,

so young, to a foreign place?

His photograph must be old —

he may now be an old man.

I love a Romios,

a handsome young man;

he too is from our village,

and he will take me without a dowry.”

Her eyes filled with tears,

her beauty dimmed at dusk;

she collapsed beside her mother

as her tears flowed freely.

The next morning at dawn,

the whole village thundered with news:

Ourania had been carried off in marriage

by the one she loved.