Hymn To The Morning - Sifnos Style
Valentine's Day 2023 I wake to the first blue sky day after weeks of winter. It feels like spring is on its way. Shutters of our little house are opened and that pure light seemingly unique to Greek islands pours into the house.
It's Valentine's day and I am lucky enough to be with someone I love and in a place that I love.
What could be more romantic than doing a supermarket shop for Valentine's day? And here is the magic madness of our Greek island life; it turns out nothing could be more romantic.
A stop is made at the Prego coffee shop. The view overlooks Kato Petali. Even after seven years I just cannot contain my exuberance for the sheer stunning beauty of our island landscape. The island is refreshed by winter rains and is all green and ready to burst forth with spring blooms. A spinach pie and coffee are ordered and we sit in the sunshine and I am just totally overwhelmed at the beauty of the stepped terraces, traditional blue and white sugar cube houses, chapels and churches that lead the eye all the way down to the sea.
Our Valentine's day supermarket excursion is better than any holiday could be. In the venture of the mundane shopping trip, there is the en-passant sublime exquisiteness of the ordinary.
One of three books that have had the most profound effect on me is Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood. Though Thomas makes fun of the fictional town of Llareggub, it's done with the same deep and abiding affection that one reserves for teasing a loved one. Nowhere is that clearer than in Thomas' Eli Jenkins' Hymn To The Morning.
This morning in our excursion to the supermarket I feel I have stepped into that poem.
Eli Jenkins's Hymn To The Morning By Dylan Thomas.
Dear Gwalia! I know there are,
Towns lovelier than ours.
And fairer hills and loftier far,
And groves more full of flowers.
And boskier woods more blithe with spring,
And bright with birds' adorning.
And sweeter bards than I to sing,
Their praise this beautious morning.
By Cader Idris, tempest-torn,
Or Moel y Wyddfa's glory.
Carnedd Llewelyn beauty born,
Plinlimmon old in story.
By mountains where King Arthur dreams,
By Penmaen Mawr defiant.
Llareggub Hill a molehill seems,
A pygmy to a giant.
By Sawdde, Senni, Dovey, Dee,
Edw, Eden, Aled, all.
Taff and Towy broad and free,
Llyfnant with its waterfall.
Claerwen, Cleddau, Dulas, Daw,
Ely, Gwili, Ogwr, Nedd.
Small is our River Dewi, lord,
A baby on a rushy bed.
By Carreg Cennen, King of time,
Our heron head is only.
A bit of stone with seaweed spread,
Where gulls come to be lonely.
A tiny dingle is Milk Wood,
By golden Grove 'neath Grongar.
But let me choose and oh! I should,
Love all my life and longer.
To stroll among our trees and stray,
In Goosegog Lane, on Donkey Down.
And hear the Dewi sing all day,
And never, never leave the town.
Written by Dylan Thomas.
(1914-1953)
And fairer hills and loftier far,
But let me choose and oh! I should,
Love all my life and longer.
To stroll along our beaches and bays,
In Kamares, Vathi and Artemon.
And hear the Sea sing all day,
And never, never leave the town.
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