The distillation of a summer
might have been that limpid August day -
the long and dusty route that swooned
in breaths of heaven laced with resin;
goats, sporadic shepherds' huts
with eyeless walls designed to foil
the pirate ships by leaving
no light visible when darkness fell;
my patient feet, those sandalled slaves,
mapping one more island byway;
avid eyes inspired by gleaming
vistas of Homeric sea…
It's not the shrine to Artemis
that I recall so vividly,
but sunflowers that raised their golden
heads along the dusty trail -
little knots of village girls
with fringed kerchiefs as aureoles,
waiting by the track as if to hail
and farewell passers-by.
They blazed against the azure sky,
daughters of that prince of light,
Apollo, scion of the sun,
twin brother to the lonely huntress.
Ikaria - the road to Nas