Paxos Poems, Jim Potts. Paxos, Greece, With Photographs. Παξοί και Αντίπαξοι, 16 Ποιήματα

Some Paxos Poems by Jim Potts

I first visited Paxos in 1967, and I have visited the island many, many times since then. I have always loved it deeply, but this hasn't stopped me writing honestly about environmental issues and the impact of tourism on the island. My wife's mother was a Paxiot, from Bogdanatika. Most of these poems were included in two of my books, Corfu Blues, Ars Interpres, 2006, and Reading the Signs, Colenso Books, 2020.

  

From Ostrias Escarpment

(looking at the new road to Avlaki Creek)

They’ve opened a road

below my secret perch:

a gash across my heart.

Paxos Haiku

With sixty-four churches to choose from

there’s no need

to feel all is lost.

Saint Haralambos

Windmills,

shrines,

bell-towers,

cisterns.

Saint Haralambos

saved them all.

He repelled the plague,

he relieved the siege.

He couldn’t stop

the desecration.

  

The bulldozers

The bulldozers

are busy on Paxos,

waiting to ravage

more pathways,

to tear down terraces,

dry stone walling,

to uproot olive and cypress,

the carob tree, myrtle and pine

out towards cape, cliff and headland,

hidden cove and well-loved lookout.

The bulldozers

are busy on Paxos,

Ripping out roots, they advance.

The bulldozers are getting more greedy,

the ground-grabbers,

the merchants of scars.

From a changing Paxos

  

The derelict engine

imported from England,

made by Petters of Yeovil,

once powered the village olive press,

faithfully turned

the grinding stone

up in Manessatika.

Stamatis wants to sell it now,

his precious but rusting antique,

“from the time of Capodistrias!”

Eremitis

No more fishing in the air,

for swallows, swifts or human souls.

They’ve built a bar by Eremitis

where people watch the sunset;

the Holy Apostles borders it.

The graveyard dead have lost their peace,

the iconostasis shudders.

Paxiots

  

Paxiots were taken

by pirates as slaves.

Nowadays

they sign up

for their servitude

freely.

(In 1663, Anastasios Bogdanos was seized by pirates as a slave)

Lapsed pantheist on Paxos

Crystal water – urchins – sharks?

Nature’s Bounty.

That vast indifference.

Tethering Rings

Now that no-one rides mules,

There’s nothing to tether

To the tethering rings.

(Stone rings, abandoned Venetian house, Vassilatika)

Family feuds

When families quarrel

over children or trees

the bitterness lasts

for generations:

the feuds outlast roofs.

No one gives way

before the walls give in.

  

Paxiot Fisherman

Where’s he gone,

the man who ate lemons,

stood on his head, when not fishing?


Inspired by Iannis Tranakas, 'O Sparos' ('The Sprat')

Eyrie on Ostrias Escarpment, Paxos

Sunset.

Lying on a ledge of stone.

Galleon’s lookout, quarter deck.

From Sweden to Paxos

Engström liked the open sea,

Strindberg loved the islands round –

Somewhere for his thoughts to settle.

A wooden studio on the rocks:

atelier, folly or writer’s hut?

Perfect for Paxos, for our Ostrias plot.

Below, a little inlet cove.

A dry-stone wall, an olive grove –

My outlook, And my chosen spot.

The Italian Boy on Paxos

  

The boy dropped the tortoise

into the bay

To see if it turned turtle.

An old Paxiot rhyme

 (from the Greek)

Paxos and Antipaxos,

worth at least a dozen Londons!
Gaios and Loggos

surpass each Paris, a thousand times!

  

  

Family Tomb, Bogdanatika, Paxos

  

Spiridon and Vassiliki,

sleep in peace

with Saint Paraskevi.

Some photographs (illustrative images):

A friend helps clear the plot

Surveying and topographic mapping

Jankos Velianitis, The Red House, Gaios

Popi and Babis

 Stamatis Boikos (ΣΤΑΜΑΤΗΣ ΜΠΟΪΚΟΣ)

Mark Allen

My mother with Jimmie Katsaros, heading for Paxos? 1968

Strindberg's Writing Stuga (Hut) on Kymmendö, Sweden

"In Praise of Paxos", pages 144-148