We are heading directly south out of town
on Leoforos Knossou – Boulevard
Knossos – a straight kilometre long
dual carriageway with oleander bushes
in the central reservation, and lined,
on both sides, with parked cars and really useful
emporia: like banks, greengrocers,
ironmongers, and proper places to eat.
After Venezelio Hospital
it suddenly becomes a country road,
and shortly we arrive at the site,
and park up under a jacaranda.
Whatever the Boeing 737
Series 800 substituted
for fresh air has laid my grand daughter
and me a little low, so only
the idea – rather than the facts of
the excavation – appeals. Anyway
we have been here before. Now we are sitting
in the shade of a pine tree planted
by the archaeologist, Arthur Evans.
We can hear one of the official guides
who has a pronounced Australian
or New Zealand accent, and wonder
if she only guides visitors from
the Antipodes. In the quiet
after she has gone we hear the hoopoes
somewhere in the valley of olive groves
beyond the high wire-mesh boundary fence.
A tabby cat walks across the Western Court,
and people seem to give way to her.
My grand daughter follows with her camera.
When she returns she tells me the cat
had placed her kittens securely behind
one of Arthur’s pines. The photos show
the litter – some tabby too, some black and white –
suckling in what seems a tumble of fur,
the mother watchful. A small crowd gathered,
she tells me. I imagine the simple,
sentient spectacle: a tall, slender girl
photographing a cat and her kittens.
By David Selzer