Dance?
Did You Say Dance? Come on my boy!

Christos Anesti! Once again, we celebrate our tradition of sharing your special Easter greetings with our readers both in print and online at hellenicjournal.org this month.

With the unexpected loss of our HJ columnist Athan Karras in February to complications from coronary bypass surgery, we take a moment to pay tribute to a man who while only 82 years young, left us too soon. He had so much to offer.

As his editor, I will miss his phone calls of encouragement and enthusiasm when it came to the HJ. He was always a champion of its mission to keep the Greek community connected. He knew the value of this. He was, after all, the ambassador of Greek dance.

In his memory, on page 4, we offer a special tribute of excerpts from his family and friends such as Professor Thanasis Maskaleris, who wrote this special poem to Athan:                                          

You left us, Thanasi, off-staging with your quietest steps…
You, who for half a century led us to the communal circle dance,
who taught us the xasapiko and the earth-touching zebekiko –
and not only the steps, but the Greek life-spirit that animates them,
the streams of our living traditions confluencing in your "Intersection",
the new threshing floor on this other-land of dancing Greeks…
(– even your e-mail address, Athan, began with "xasapiko…")
When you reach Charon's shore, do not teach him how to dance, Athan…
For if you do, he will rage and summon more pallikaria to join you,
in that insubstantial dance of shadows, where there is no sunlight…
As for us, Thanasi, we'll always remember and miss your dancing levendia,
your hands in the circling dance " the hands that held the hands of Homer"...                             

May his memory be eternal.

Frosene Phillips