In Kythera 2019. For Helen Carey.
Posted: November 27, 2019 Filed under: Poem, Uncategorized | Tags: Greece, Helen Carey, Kythera, Poem, Poetry, romance 3 CommentsWe met on the Greek island of Kythera ( pictured above) in June 2000, and returned, for the first time in 14 years, this June. It was magical when we met, and it (all) still is. On the same trip we met Hera, but that’s another story, maybe another poem. But for now, this is for Helen, who has my heart.
How did two decades
All but a year,
Slip by?
Filio laughed and hugged us, even cried,
The bamboo drifted in the soft breezed warmth
You and I, beside.
The taverna table laid up for two
Where once I waited
And the taxi ( thankfully)
never arrived, instead,
There was you.
As the wild thyme keened the air,
The kestrel plummeted
Geese hissed in a dust bowled olive grove
and the first cicadas of the summer began to drum.
Bees, drunk hummed on myrtle sipped nectar
Seawards spiralled
The blue and yellow collided
Over Kapsali mountainside.
Near Mitata, the church tower split, stricken,
We walked a new path
Crunched ancient shells underfoot
Stressed from the strains of bygone volcanoes
Tiny flowers grasped life from thin soil
A goat danced, windwarded.
How graceful you were
As we spanned the unknown
Having walked the Englishman’s Bridge
Revisited a love story
Writ large.
On the island where love erupted,
Bloomed, prospered, sun soaked
No longer alone.
Mediterranean delight,
Grecian pleasure.
We wrapped it tight,
Flew north,
Made it home.
Now, needs must
That I guard the treasure.
In Crete we dreamed in blue
Posted: November 14, 2018 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Chania, creative writing, Crete, Greece, Helen Carey, Helen Carey Historical fiction WW2 WW11 Sagas, Kingfishers, Kythira, Poetry 9 CommentsWe had a holiday in Crete a little while back. The sea and sky were as blue as can be. The greens were equally intense. The kingfisher combined all these colours. The sunsets bled into the sea.
Helen and I met on a Greek Island, Kythira, when she was teaching creative writing. I was one of her students…I came home with the First Prize.
Helen Carey, this one’s for you.
(Oh! And hats off to Homer too! And a muted apology to the writer of ‘Grease’)
IN CRETE WE DREAMED IN BLUE
It’s autumn
But in Crete the leaves are not yet falling
And I’m bursting with life
Olive grove glad
Back Home
In the land of the Iliad
We are here
Our 18th year
Greece, the landscape
Soaked in ancient Sage
Washed with Thyme
History beyond belief
And the nearly new
That’s me and you.
In our spring
Kythera was King
Oleander lit the way
Winding down dusted tracks to
The azure blue, Kapsali bay,
Hora above, gleaming alabaster white
In our autumnal , peacocked Crete
Kingfishers dripping jewels in flight
Across the Lake at Agir
Turtles stroke the tranquil waters at Koumas
Now, in the dream dented, honeyed night
My Cretan Queen whispers
Impish delight
“Greece is the word”
And I heard
And I heard
A hymn to Greece (Kythira to be precise) #2
Posted: May 9, 2013 Filed under: Ageing issues, Poem | Tags: ageing well, blue sky., coffe, Greece, honey 1 CommentI think
that I could live
live well
and long
in a little town
like Livadi
where the Greek coffee
at Rena’s café
is strong
and sweet
and where some of the men
of this small town
meet
to chew the fat
as the honey streaked sun
beats them
into the shade