POEM BY KOSTAS KRYSTALLIS
MARIA’S APRON
excerpt
Maria was washing her clothes in the river,
her beauty shining, her body sparkling too
beneath her lines of silver buttons and her necklaces,
her snow-white legs clear in the crystal waters
as if they could be roses made of milk.
The hunters and their servants saunter by,
and some declare her sun-born and others see a nymph.
A golden eagle flies above her and dazzled by
her beauty plunges down toward the riverbed
and grasps the maiden’s apron. Maria’s left
alone to mourn her apron’s loss, embroidered
with the flowers of the earth, stars of the sky…
Libros Libertad 