The perfect union of the warmest sun and the most refreshing wind. Smiles of strangers, now familiar faces. Five minds and hearts, five vibrations and colors, an indistinct rainbow as travel companion. Life of self-absorbed villages in Kriti's heart, an old man sitting out the bar. Fast moving eyes, eager to get every single branch of olive trees passing by... and the leaves falling behind as a continual green stripe between the light brown soil and the sky. Rawness that bites our senses and leaves us a fragment of itself without losing its eternity. Greetings from the insignificance of our moment compared to the landscape's symmetry. And yet, for us, those minutes are sealed into mortal memory. Poor leaning trees, beat by the ceaseless wind that blows in the veins of the giant island... Spectacle of colours and shadows of a sunset surrounded by hypnotizing hills. Astros gradually showing off... first is the crescent moon and its perfect curves contrasting the dark blue/grey/orange skyline... then a lonely star whose brightness outshines alone, until the grey and orange decline. And only then, with the sun long gone, and your heart in your mouth, you understand why the trees were leaning down south.

Sweet nectar trickles down my chin,
The knife slips in sticky hands,
A nibble here, a lick there,
Sparks memory,
Of golden deliciousness of summers past,
scoldings from Mum for unrepentant gluttony,
Tangy sour smells of unripe fruit,
Swings swaying under the Mango tree
And a childhood happy as can be
~ Kriti Mishra

The Shaded Tree

There's nothing like a warm summer day
To picnic under a shaded tree, a gentle breeze
To cool your mood as you gobble down food
Swatting at flies from your fries and pies, make you

Want to close your eyes, and conjure up a beehive
No repellant to ward off the any invasion trekking on
The picnic basket, carrying bits of food as they steadily
Form a line gathering up the chunks of rind, and making

There way to that ant hill mine, you close your eye's
And take a deep breath of nature's fragrant air
Wishing you were in Kriti Crete or on a cruise ship
Sailing the islands, and listening to the music drumming

In your ears, no care of fear as you swat the flies and stomp
The ants as they steadily approach the spot you enjoyed
For a little while, neither glance skyward to see the clouds
Float by, nor nap under the shaded tree

As you pack up the picnic basket, and shake out the crumbs
On the blanket, you glance up at the leaves on the tree branches
With a thought to come back another day to have
A picnic and sit under a big shaded tree