Katina Cremona

            Banda Landra
for Eleni

I remember lying on yoga mats, head to toe
under a dark swirling sky. An intimate breeze

seeped into our skin. Our cells soaked
in a bath of bells, chimes and gongs.

You spoke for the speechless with your
rush of laughter. We signed up for

the following year, floated home into the night
thrumming with life. But you died while

I was away and the sweet sound bath woman
stopped working on Kythira. I’d barely begun

to know you as our island’s anaesthetist who swam
in maxi dresses, believed in fairies. I thought

we’d bask for years to come but our beloved
bar, Banda Landra, closed for summer.

Someone could die before they glance
at this stanza. I want to remember to be like you.

To plunge into this wild life.
This shared meal. This heartbeat.

Katina Cremona is a Greek-Australian who lives between the island of Kythira and Athens in Greece. She works as a psychologist, psychotherapist and leadership coach at IMD business school in Lausanne, Switzerland.