Reflections

SPRINGS EXODUS The path separates and twists ahead and my thoughts turn to you Midera. You vanished with your last breath, but I carry your humble smile with me in these hills that surrounded you years ago. The wild rosemary’s scent no longer in the air or on my hands when I touch it. The delicate blue alkanet will be gone too. Along with the bright red poppies that grow alone or in clusters – symbols of soldiers losing their lives at war. Their red will pale, their petals and seeds carried away on the wind to continue the soldiers’ eternal journey. The impending heat relentless sucking life from the flourished blooms and the earth swallowing all the colours. The bees no longer drinking the nectar or filling their bodies with pollen; they will fly to where blooms of a different season flourish to continue pollinating and gifting us their honey. The robust low-lying shrubs continue staying anchored to the white hills, hibernating until the rains fall heavy again. Drenching downpours from the murky sky mercifully pounding the earth. Rain flowing down ravines widening, deepening, until they resemble small waterfalls unseen.

On a warm day in Skarinou Cyprus, I'd sit in the courtyard of my past ancestral home. My note taking book by me, a Cypriot author friends' novel and When the Past is Left on the table.

My memoir a reminder of my mother Maria and why I stayed for two months.

My past ancestral home... I wish it were mine...

I'm in the process of writing a new memoir. It's in the multiple editing stage by me.

And before professional edits.

I started writing in this room which is my past ancestral home. That is now holiday accommodation.

Was I a tourist? Or did I belong?