Kathleen Granchelli is an emerging poet living in Massachusetts. Following a four-year stint teaching English at the high-school and college levels, she moved to Greece to explore the culture. Upon return to the U.S., she transitioned to a career in communications and community relations for a not-for-profit R&D organization.
Currently Kathleen is developing a chapbook based on existing work while writing new poems for a future book of ekphrastic poetry based on Minoan frescoes. In 2024, Seven Bridge Writers’ Collaborative published six of her poems.
after Minoan fresco, Akrotiri, Greece
Before dawn
before heat of island sun
shadow figures
descend in dark
along rocky paths
mothers and daughters set
to crocuses carrying baskets.
One plucks a purple blossom,
fingers slide in, grasp threads,
lift a trinity of stigmas—
trumpets of crimson
precursors to rising sun—
again and again
flower to flower
flames kiss her nails blood red
as poised in the moment,
she holds red gold.
All That Magnificence
That time at the Acropolis alone
I wandered in the blistering Hellas heat
wondering about the sacked temple sculptures.
I imagined Phidias and his assistants
mounting the Parthenon marbles,
an offering to Athena,
the frieze sweeping high and heavenly
across the sacred space.
More than two millennia later
all that magnificence plundered
by imperial impulse, a royal looter
desecrating the ancient site—
gone those priceless treasures to another land.
-August 1979
Savoring a Glass of Retsina
Today in the taverna
as we savored a glass of retsina
its turpentine flavor and sharp
bracing taste on the tongue,
we talked of the times
when resin of pitch pine
was infused into wine
before barrels slowed spoilage
and glass offered bottles airtight,
but the custom remained,
resin retained,
preserving retsina’s keen bite.
Poetry in this post: © Kathleen Granchelli
Published with the permission of Kathleen Granchelli