Arrows

excerpt

I threw a good part of the kindling into the fire and took two sticks
out of it, brandishing one to scare the intruder and keeping the other
as high as my wound would permit. As the flames spread more
light, I saw Tamanoa was peering through the entrance hole.
He was grinning.
“My friend, I am glad to see you,” he said.
“Anteater!” I said.
The poultice had fallen off my wound. The wound wasn’t big at
all, but it was swollen and tender. He pointed to his missing nose.
“I’ll trade you,” he said.
“How did you find me?”
“I brought you here. With Apacuana. She knew this place. It’s
very complicated, Father. Her man. There is trouble for her if he
finds out.”
Tamanoa told me what happened. After the horses were attacked,
Chacao had led his people in the jungle. The Spanish would not dare
follow, especially without their horses. Tamanoa had seen me fall to
the ground. He was coming to my aid when Apacuana appeared.
Together they dragged me into the bushes. She stayed with me
while Tamanoa went back to the camp where he stole Pánfilo’s
hammock. As he did so, several people had seen him running with
the hammock in his arms but nobody had bothered to stop him.
Everyone was more concerned with rounding up the horses.
Tamanoa and Apacuana covered me with greenery until
nightfall, guarding me from their perch in a treetop. Together they
had bundled me into the hammock and carried me to safety.
I had followed Apacuana, and she responded to my instinct to be
with her. In her mind, the Spanish warriors were monstrous. It made
no sense to return me to them.
Nowthat Josefa had learned ofmy secret, I didn’t belong to Losada’s
camp, for I had clearly violated the legitimacy of my priesthood. I felt
more concerned for Tamanoa’s predicament than my own.
“I wasn’t eager to be there when Pánfilo returned and learned I
had taken his hammock,” Tamanoa explained, “so I made the
decision to leave them.”

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0981073522

Swamped

excerpt

But this time, when they reach the water their dad leads them
to a movie theater where the film Ulysses is playing in which Nicolas’s
favorite actor, Kirk Douglas, plays the role of Odysseus. It is only the
second time in their lives they have entered a theater. The first time
was in Crete when, after prodding from the schoolteacher, their parents
took them to Chania to see The Greatest Story Ever Told, a film
about the life of Jesus. Today they walk into the cool darkness of the
theater to enjoy the heroics of Odysseus, which they have learned
about in school, and how he managed to escape the horrible Cyclops
and all other adventures he had before reaching his home island of
Ithaca again and being reunited with his son, Telemachus, and his
wife Penelope. The boys knew the whole storyline by heart, and they
are entranced to see it all acted out on the huge glowing screen of the
movie theater.
When the movie is over, they walk outside and struggle for a moment
to adjusting to the sunlight again, but they are soon distracted
by the ice cream cones their dad buys them, which they relish down
to the last lick. There are a lot of people on the promenade, strolling
from one side of the harbor to the other, and the boys and their parents
slowly make their way to the White Tower where the boys play
with other children their age while the parents rest on benches
nearby and keep a close eye on them.
When evening arrives and the sun is almost on the western horizon,
they climb the road to Sikies. Nicolas holds his father’s hand and
Eteocles his mom’s. It is a warm evening and Eteocles feels sweaty.
He rubs his face on his mom’s arm, absorbing a little of the coolness
of her skin, and she looks at him and says to her husband, “He’ll be
a woman’s man when he grows up.” His father only smiles, walking
proudly, happy to be with his wife and his children again, far away
from the difficult days in Crete where he was tortured almost every
night by the local police to pressure him to spy on the customers
coming and going at his popular café, which he steadfastly refused
to do. And now it is a pleasant day of April, and Eteocles and Nicolas
are at school in Salonica.

https://draft2digital.com/book/3562976

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08WP3LMPX

The Incidentals

The Epaulets
Forty years in the service.
Arm Forces, black book
of protocol strong, unbending
stiff like his back which because of
his endlessly lifelong upright
unyielding, unswerving posture
became incapable of softness
he duly obeyed army orders passed
down to his lower officers,
foot soldiers, the infantry
who always carried the weight
of each command and the general
stands before his mirror to reflect on
exercises, nightly duty at the front
line of fire, a general only can order
and stand upright to observe the results of
orders: attack, charge, shoot,
kill, avenge, exhume hatred, maim
exhausted innocent civilians
hatred he felt and now as
he stares at his idol feeling
the most despicable hatred
for the general who knows how
to give orders on how to massacre
human dignity, general hiding
his ballooned superiority behind colors
of flag or insignia, shining epaulets
stitched on his shoulders
he wondered how many dead soldiers
represented everyone
of his medals, a general who
followed a path chosen
by his predecessors, he too obeyed
a rule others put together, he too
led the prearranged life of someone
orchestrated for this proud general
who never dared write his page
in the black book of military rules.

https://draft2digital.com/book/3745812

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763637