1971:
Driving
down the mountains to the
To
where
One
looks down on the sky
Suddenly
unfolded below like the sea:
The
least blue air lapping the tide at the horizon
Like
shallow water, boundary
Of the
sea at sky’s rim.
The
world is upside down.
It’s
1971 in the ruins.
Drink
in the air. Breathe the water when you
swim.
The
land as well takes on an opposing shape,
Breaking
into young olive instead of death.
Water
finds, in time,
The
way of blossoming bells and bundled ripe
Fruit
with black salt juice, in the sheath
Of
oak’s sharp bronze flame.
But
sea reminds season:
From
the start, you’re desert,
And
rain is only skin, part
Falling
sky, part water rising.
If you
could live without thinking of the house,
Never
again stirring the famous bottomless sink,
If
memory the friend, not foe,
For
once let go gently without using force,
Never
tried the lid of the heating-oil tank,
Or
seen the firebomb beneath the Ford:
Could
all shine unseen—
The
water in the well, the pond,
A
pail, a hose, the
Without
your testing, what surfaces might remain?
Hours
trade places in the goldfish pool.
Its
bottlecap of sun has silvered off course
And
winks in greenlipped pieces.
The
feet slip on the edge of the painted tile,
The
knees lock in memory’s suspense.
To
know this murky place
But
not what’s what, to enter
The
warm water slowly.
If
it’s solid, it must be you.
It is
to begin again the climb down to center.
Tennis
balls volley all day long
Off
the blank side of the house next door,
Pocking
the wall with dust:
Each
soft print blending with another. A
string
Of
dusty round prints twisting without care.
Twanging
of racket guts,
Of
hollow rubber balls.
Hear
the sound between the echoes?
The
echoes over-running source?
Beneath
the rusty updraft as an echo swells:
In the
well in the yard with the cement seal,
Where
an old woman had fallen in years before
And
for many hours lay
At the
black bottom of the well-hole,
Curles
half in krio nero, half in air,
Awaiting
a voice in reply.
Children
chipped at the cover
With
rocks from the yard.
It
cracked and they heard
The
cement splashing down fifty feet lower.
The
maid told the story. From the kouzina she ran
Cursing
them back – malaka! – a kako word.
But
down the dark throat
Of the
hole, as the shrunken surface would sharpen,
The
raised left hand grew into a right hand
Against
the sky-topped nero:
Like
the image in a telescope
Held
the wrong way.
The
lens, the squinting eye.
But in
the house water ran out of a pipe.
When
they stood as close as she did, as close
As a
bucket above the well, hands on the very lip,
Shoulders
touching but still,
They
hung there an instant as she did before release.
In
that mercury curve of sky and tree-top
At the
bottom of the well,
The
dark hoods of their heads
Rippled,
unsettled, as if aware
The
remaining water was unclear
About
the time remaining to trace what fades.
So in
the earth, in stone walls with jagged crowns
So
deep the flying weeds spare seeds and root,
(Treacherous
climb-over),
In
another yard with a thicker lawn,
In the
pond where the tennis balls float,
In the
yellow cowlicked fur,
Where
clear bubbles gleam,
In
each facet and glint,
In
each pattern and print:
Thin
fate. After a purposeless wide time.
The
long weather of this life. The changing
odds,
A bad
sign become goof, or faceless dice,
Or
hardwoods trunk by trunk,
Each
marble step tripped. Exactly 57
hardwoods.
And
inside the bedroom off the winding staircase,
The
crystal radio link.
A
needle scratching on
A
wired chip of stone,
And
static filling the earphone.
It was
like finding a deep splinter with a pin,
All
those words from the parlor without play.
They
came out again in the same order each night,
An
argument in one voice.
In the
play of sunlight on the tall window,
A
glimmer dances, a little V of light,
Like
the gulls one draws
(With
a lead molivi) on waves,
One
short and one long wing.
But love was something
In the
argument that did not move with grace.
Pigdin
Greek meant more than lying English.
Kefali mean head in the schoolbook,
or kefalya!
At
practice on the soccer field
In the
quarry, the ending slurred with anguish
To
direct the one waiting beneath the ball
To
head it and be bold.
The
bevelled quarry sides
Returned,
word by word,
A
sense of a sentence shouted,
Words
re-forming later as the wind would decide.
Mystery
took to arriving out of order.
In the
mind, pictures of the half-cocked day,
Maples
growing at an angle,
But
the water showed a vase on the ocean floor
Out of
reach, missing a sharktooth of clay,
And in
a brimming tin pail
Under
the garden spigot,
Under
some stones lay
A
numbered steel key.
You
drank it in, unbreathing. Then you spat.
The
route to
Brown-as-dust
bread, and well-water at the finish.
No
news so heavy as this,
When
the runner’s blood boils and thins,
And in
rising fever he thinks his heart refreshed.
He
forgets to tell his news,
Curling
slowly like a flower
Cut
and kept from water,
Dying,
his feet bleeding.
The
vantage of the turning ocean-glass air:
The
camoflaged
Like a
falling net. The blend
Of
painted brown-and-yellow stripes together
Swim
above the burnt sand in a fleet.
The
burial mound across the road
Lumps
together the Greeks fallen
Who,
in the stories, always rise
And
will not meet invading eyes
Without
weapons. But it’s 1971 in the ruins…
And
back in the yard, the gardener’s face never alters.
In his
right hand a drooping hose sputters,
A
gold-banded cigarette
Ebbs
in his left. He is paid to water:
There
is no grass, but in the changed hour
When
dusk comes in half-lit,
Heat
in the ground comes loose,
And
thick worms of water
Burrow
in the dusty powder.
He
makes the garden paths appear in place.
His
black bike held one pint of gasoline,
And
until he was done, it slept in the shade.
Then
he’s stomp the pedal to spark,
And
ride out the gate astride the choking engine,
Smiling
with delight at the bills in a wad
Folded
in his watch-pocket,
With
strips of precious metal
In
them, real money,
The
paper wrinkled and pulpy.
Goes
where he goes, after doing nothing well.
To
spend your pay in Kifissia’s town center,
A shot
of sour coffee, a snort of ouzo,
And
light a drachma candle.
Close
your eyes for what’s gone from the altar.
Ride
down a thin street like an alley
Past
the shutter panels
Closing
at midday, covering
The
pople until late
Afternoon. They rise to the heat,
Trading
addresses of American homes that were hiring.
The
ear that tries to play new tricks with time,
The
eye projecting all the caught light:
No
sense endures memory.
Time
above all. The scene change never came.
One
might stand with ocean up to the knees
For
two thousand years
But
history’s out of each,
Building
or burning on a shore
The
swimmer can’t get near.
Greek
army tanks parade by the beach.
But
there, for an instant, the day took on night,
And
the sun in the sky itched in the skin.
High
rode low tide.
In the
darkness sleep was humming one note
In
each head the whole ride back home:
Quiet
children nodded,
The
driver was part car,
Part
God, part ghost.
All
light was streaming past
In the
instant day took on night there.