The noon sky’s the color of undyed linen with undertones
of gray, the weeds on the cliffs a slick green shiny
as olive leaves on a summer day. No one owns
anything here anymore, or so proclaims the graffiti
white-washed on boulders and rock face, protests
scrawled on posts against the tyrannical power
of death and war. A gull on a wall watches crests
of waves slap fishing boats’ hulls, the water
limpid, translucent blue. Must the dead wander
on these beaches, each with his stick and dimming
sight, bodies withered like a vine on a stake? I reach
out my arms to greet you, my Theodoros, we two
to be together soon in that land which allows no singing,
dancing, feasting, hopes, yet knows no betrayals: you
and I now bound to a world whose enticing wordless speech
we’ve heard before on windy nights, in the silent roar of the sea.
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