Philemon and Baucis
Plundering didn’t touch our made of sticks hut
dark blue river that encircled us
didn’t make a dent in the conflagration of the city
we laid our limbs
onto the covers of the sun
cared by the sob of our hands
born in idolatry and grace
If we got whipped by the spring windstorm
it was because the winters
opened and shut around us like Symplegades
our unspoken hour bloomed among the cypresses
we gazed the trees that with no tie nor watch
listened to the flow of their sap
stretching their fingers with selfless supplication
and when the gods arrived we welcomed them
because we imagined people like them
not being lucky to ponder
on the uncounted discretion
we didn’t think of death as our Fate
we who have known our forgetfulness
Now our silence a roof over the nakedness of time
Manolis Aligizakis 