Greece My Love
My New Year's Resolution
How can one relax and even sleep during a raging pandemic? To be extra careful in order to stay very safe depends on many factors, some of which are difficult if not impossible to execute and ultimately control. To be or not to be adopts a different disposition that may feel or at least seem new in a world still keen on living as if the all clear had sounded on Mount Olympus and on every other peak.
My love affair with Greece began during the pandemic, when I read some unusual poetry by Anthi Psomiadou, a Greek writer here on Vocal, and imagined Goddess Athena accepting to take me for her mortal mate. I am not sure which event occurred first, but I was also led to write about Greece and invent my own Anthi, a character which has become my principal topic since February 2021.
Writing medical reports at home for a living before the pandemic had continued with catlike commitment during this global malaise, but had acquired, almost imperceptibly, a need to turn my fiction into some reality. I decided to move to Greece and live next to new sources of relaxation and better sleep. Both Hypnos and Morpheus were beseeching me to sail to their shores, but I settled for a few flights.
I flew from Montreal to Athens in October 2021 for 17 days and nights; a long time haiku of discovery and joy, which could have culminated within the past glory of the Parthenon if not for a Greek woman who filled my chest with love and longing. I left them, Greece and Athena, only to return in mid-December for an undetermined period of time with my novel one-year renewable visa.
I sleep and awake next to a garden of lemon trees and other wonderful plants frequented by feline familiars and ancient air. The Gulf of Aegina is less than 500 metres away, waving to me while I write. Greece my love, I ponder incessantly as I kiss Athena from every possible angle. I dismiss Rome—I always did—for Greece. By Zeus has replaced By Jove, though Shakespeare will always lead my literary part.
...
Every Rose Is Blue: An Anthi Sonnet
Every rose is blue, even the red one
Yellow, white, pink, orange, peach, you name it
It is blue inside in view of the Sun
In the firmament, as it knows to split
Its essence between sheer reality
Intertwined with blue soulful behaviour
While sailing across the Aegean Sea
Searching for an Olympian Saviour
Patrick beseeched before impending end
Statue after statue for Athena
M followed him to Athens, story-penned
Discovering his Anthi Kanéna
Both fell in love with a woman, by Zeus
But M feels his Anthi within his Nous
...
Greece Versus Rome: Acrostic Alexandrines
Give me your words so I can rape them forever
Rome was my bloody name and me you never left
Every path and bridge to me you cannot sever
Enveloped in time I cannot become bereft
Cancel the past and you only cancel yourself
Embrace the present and leave your fate on a shelf
...
Remember we will always your renowned torment
Overbearing by your sword and lack of fancy
Meandering through centuries of discontent
Ensuring your mean success by theomancy
...
Greeks will never repudiate their history
Resolve will always traverse our mythology
Engendering what you uttered in poetry
Enclosing each thought you ever deemed ology
Cocks will continue to call you by your namesake
Eventually giving Greece its rightful stake
...
Hooked on Kronos*: An Ode to Greece
One night weekly we stay on a planet
Named Kronos by the Greeks not Rome
That did can it
As they introduced their syndrome
Of copying the complete Greek gamut.
The victor may clepe all that he sees fit
Howbeit the truth wins
Counting the sins
When a republic cannot ever quit.
...
Anthi leads the way at first by a foot
‘Tis bare and beautiful to see
Her sinciput
At the other extreme is key
To comprehend my cardiac output.
I hold her hand cock-a-hoop and convex
We sit within a ring
On a blue swing
Looking at each other and the apex.
...
Kronos calms my chest except for my love
That cannot cease to envelop
Anthi above
Anthi below to develop
Further our contact with Kronos thereof.
Astral luminance circles her talent
Of capturing my glee
With her to be
Rendering me inherently gallant.
...
* The original Greek name of Saturn.
About the Creator
Patrick M. Ohana
A medical writer who reads and writes fiction and some nonfiction, although the latter may appear at times like the former. All my stories (over 2,200 pieces) are/will be available on/via Shakespeare's Shoes.
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