900 brides, by Fotoula Reynolds


The skins of eggplants
Glisten in the garden
And as the light reshapes
Her elbow and wraps
Around her body, it’s time
Time to make her journey

April is filled with springtime
And as her Greek Mother
Relieves her of her duties
She pulls the soft white thread of
Her name from her Father’s throat
And pledges to never forget him

Inside her empty hands
She is hungry for a better life
The smell of pepper and pine
Will travel with her, in her soul
A diaspora, a migration story of
Language and culture to retell

900 brides on board the Begona
Married by proxy to a photograph
Guarded closely the entire way
Husbands wait with flowers
From Athens to Melbourne
Women pioneers disembark in 1957

- Fotoula Reynolds


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