by Eugene Datta
The olive grove next to Hotel Karavostási is full of fruit. I didn’t know how bitter fresh olives taste until I ate one the other day. It took the sharp sourness of a half-ripe mandarin to tame the riot of tannins on my tongue.
Two mandarin trees in front of the hotel are also full of fruit, half a crest of blooming bougainvillea above the locked entrance. Closer to the hill, on the same side of the narrow road, Hotel Elina is also closed, the water in the pool near its entrance almost pitch-dark. Next to its perimeter wall, a discarded two-wheeler trying to hide itself from view. Sheep droppings on the roadside remind me of the blue-eyed shepherd I’d taken pictures of the last time I was here, his flock scuttling on as he’d stopped for me—a wavering, moments-long stream of sheep sound and sheep smell.
Where the road bends toward the sea, a for sale sign points a hand-painted arrow 100 meters inland. Closer to the beach, grapes hang from vines along a fence, some having turned to raisins. On the other side of the fence, a vegetable patch with cabbage and paprika, fruit trees, a dog and a young bull. A shuttered mini market with a locked freezer. Facing the sea, a beach bar on the left and a tavern on the right, both in off-season squalor, upturned tables and chairs, empty display fridges, heaps of discarded things. In a patch of grass next to the bar, a row of cacti, and a red boat on its side facing a white one. Then fallen leaves and wind-ripped flags of Greece, and empty beach tents knee-deep in ocean meditation.
in the viewfinder
a gull above two sailboats
unreleased shutter
Eugene Datta is the author of the poetry collection Water & Wave (Redhawk, 2024) and the story collection The Color of Noon (Serving House Books, 2024), which has won the first Walter Cummins Award for Short Fiction. His work has appeared widely both online and in print, with some having been anthologized, and translated into German, French, Arabic, and Italian. He has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and the Touchstone Award for Individual Haibun. A native of Calcutta, he lives in Aachen, Germany.
January House Literary Journal 
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