Musings from Skopelos


 
1.   PANORMOS: THE SEA CHOOSES ITS FRIENDS CAREFULLY
 
This stretch of sea is miserly: it saves
its mildest mood for evening, when the shore
is more or less deserted, and the waves
have stopped invading eyes and ears of those who swam before.
 
Perhaps, however, it’s concerned to test
the quality of our relationship –
favoring local folk, and loving best
the boys who come at twilight, who can make the pebbles skip.
 
 
2.   THE WINE- DARK SEA
                        οἶνοψ πόντος
 
        A long swim
        in the Aegean
        concentrates
        the urine
        wonderfully.
 
 
3.   THE TWO CULTURES
 
For the Skopelos waiters – who channel Milton

Each bank employee must be taught to spurn a
long-standing customer.  He takes a test
designed to pick the talented who turn a
client away, most thoroughly depressed.
 
The waiters working in a Greek taverna
must qualify for different degrees:
each one must show himself an eager learner
of ways to put the visitors at ease.
 
Although the waiter is the lesser earner,
for friendly interest – we must be frank –
even when coping with a picky “fur’ner”,
the Greek taverna whomps the Yankee bank.

Philip Kitcher

 
If you have any thoughts about this poem, Philip Kitcher would be pleased to hear them