Καλλιτεχνικός Σύλλογος Δημοτικής Μουσικής Δόμνα Σαμίου

In yonder machalá,¹ amán,² o Yorgalaki, yonder,
there’s running water running there – they call it silver water.

If any mother drinks of it she’ll not give birth to children.
– You drank it, mother, didn’t you, so you’ld not give birth to me?
But having given birth to me, what do you want of me now?
I’m wandering in foreign lands, in foreign lands I labour.
They’re foreign girls as wash my clothes, in dolly-tubs they wash them.
They wash them once, they wash them twice, they wash them thrice and five times.
And having washed them out five times, they cast them in the alleys.
– Go fetch your clothes, my foreign lad, go, fetch your coarse old homespuns.
Take them, and to your mother hie, hie with them to your sister.
– Had I but mother and sister here I would not bring them to you.

Translated by John Leatham

¹machalá: aTurkish word meaning quarter or neighbourhood
²amán: a Turkish exclamation meaning oh!, mercy!, help!