Reading:
A wind from Africa A wind from Africa dried us with no need for towels As we lay in the shade beneath ripening vines. Tanned bodies frolicked in choppy waves stirred By the onshore wind. Almost at once We feel it’s time for a light lunch, salad say, And take our seats in Antonio’s, but two steps away. A wind from Africa scorches a thousand greenhouses and those flimsy Plastic tunnels that harbour trees that grow the fruits for Europe. Peaches, nectarines and oranges by the kiloton leave here on lorries. Behind the bay that runs from Montalbano’s house in Punta Secca, Men are planting palms along the streets of yet another rash Of villas. Many will be left unfinished as developers run out of cash. A wind from Africa brought in bodies of those drowned When their overloaded dinghy capsized only meters From the safety of the beach. Fifteen corpses under sheets Laid in a line upon the dunes at Sampieri, Where we had swum just months before. What hopes they had as they pushed off from that Libyan shore! A wind from Africa fanned the flames that burned the underbrush. We drove through smoke of verges still on fire, hot with shame As our Golf belched out our contribution towards global warming. Next time, we assured ourselves, we’d find a way to come by train. If things don’t change, that wind will burn the very soil of Sicily one day; The granary that fed the Roman Empire turn to desert. One can only pray.
Peter Lloyd Jones 