The village occupied by cloud
harbours one old partisan.
Ouzo-crazed, convinced the war's
still on, he snipes at rough
slate roofs: grey scales - Saint
George - dismembered dragon; walls
annulled by war and rain.
Village moulded to earth's shoulder -
nesting-place of nightingales,
where Byzantine ossuaries spill
relics, and ancestral choirs
stifle in dust and desiccated
bones. Black angel hovering
in mist a woman clicks her tongue -
beckoning me, fills my hands with walnuts
hard as shrunken skulls.
Hunters stalk the high red road,
the way to old Skotina.
From villages replete with peace,
ex-partisans shoot pigs.
Cloud reaches clammy fingers down
and down. Amnesia. Anomie.
Abandoned Village - Mount Olympus
© Copyright: Jena Woodhouse, 2003
Свидетельство о публикации №103022300345
Свидетельство о публикации №103022300345
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