Needed Shade
The whitewash, the paper, the marble, blinding
brilliance in the sunshine; the pure white is horror.
We fill the walls with names, Iolaus, Patroclus,
Antilochus , while in the ancient nakedness the cicadas
scream “A shade, a shade” the harvester yells down in
the grapevine field, “A shade” his echo answers from
the standing boulders.
A shade to cool the eye — not to hide in it — that
minimal shade with the two ends, the shade under
the breasts of the headless statue.
Manolis Aligizakis 