Greece

Poem

by Ksenija Spasic

We are leaving
the sun does not have to try any more
to sweat mixing oil and honey
over the blue fire of the sea
Instead it rests behind a cloud
and sometimes dribbles watered lemon juice
onto the stony hills

When I arrived
eager to clutch my way up cliffs and plunge
like breathless Icarus into blue bays
it was a different Greece welcomed me
A land bright, hard and humming
with the heat of a thousand cicadas
rubbing their wings

But now
these hills rest easy
in the mist and silence of a closing day
like a sleeping lover
when all familiar curves of muscle,
crests of bone
are released from passion and stretch indifferent
remote, immersed in sleep

I long for home
but olive branches
catch my slipping gaze
their narrow leaves
cut stinging sorrows in my heart
it seems I have just found the sea
and must now forget the way again
forget the white dust
that temples become
lay down my brief love
and go quietly
into an even world

I go

When we are strangers
welcome me again