_14. Koufonnisia

My body is
an indolent rubber around noon
unfit even for beach-going,
only for attempting translucence,
I’ll move so slowly I’ll forget
the heat like those metals
that bend but spring back
to life: liquid memory.
If I ride out the day I’ll
be rewarded by the beachside
in late afternoon and grilled
prawns for dinner here
on the coast of this island
that’s entirely coast, manned
by a population of 300 not
pioneers but survivors (the Greeks
have been here forever moving from empire
to empire to a tired populace).
We lose the afternoon
in a cafe listening to
Thievery corporation and staring
at the Mediteranean. It boils
even in the shade save the
brief breezes so timeliness
I’ve run out of metaphors for them.