Day 562 of the daily poems; our poet today Fiona Clark recalls – pace Ovid – an encounter with a kind old couple in the Peloponnese. Quite beautiful.
Baucis and Philemon
Walking through the Peloponnese
in carefree youth,
drinking cool water
from village fountains,
by forgotten shrines,
or wild and rocky springs.
Then later, on the scorching Spartan plain,
where red earth gapes for longed-for showers
beneath an aromatic cypress tree,
slow, trickling streams seem distant memories.
Raking their vineyard, an old couple pause,
seeing us sheltering in the shade,
bring water, grapes and conversation,
obeying hospitality’s ancient rules,
for strangers may be the gods, disguised,
wishing us long happiness, we guess –
it’s all Greek to us, we nod and smile,
but surely, we’ve been blessed.
and later, on the ancient rattling bus,
we look back, to see them gazing after us,
leaning on their rakes, shading their eyes,
Baucis and Philemon, rooted to their soil
soon to grow intertwining branches at their gate, sprout leaves,
and live forever near the harvest of their grapes.
So long ago. Now we have travelled through the years,
on many stony roads, and together we’ve found soil, grown roots and leaves,
and branches latticed tight as willow gates,
and somewhere in the distant Spartan plain
they are red dust.
Fiona Clark