Strolling through Corfu Town looking for lunch,
Here’s something promising –
A pastel-coloured café, stylish –
And vegetarian! that’s unusual.
It makes up one side of a small plateia;
In which, centre stage, we see a life-size statue,
Also beyond the commonplace;

This bronze holds no heroic pose,
But crouches, or maybe genuflects?
No, it’s more casual, the young man’s hands
Hanging limply over each raised knee –
We later learn the sculptor based it|
On a seaside snap.
We read the dedication.

“Kostas Georgakis, native of Corfu,
Died aged just twenty-two in Genoa;
Autopyrpolithiké ” –
Burned himself to death,
In terrible protest and despair
At Greece’s subjugation
By fascist colonels.

Disturbed by this lad’s sacrifice,
We pause until tears have eased,
And only then proceed
To enter the bright café,
Somehow emblematic
Of this modern Greece,
Free and democratic.

April 2023

You will see the statue and the seaside photo at https://greekcitytimes.com/2022/09/19/september-19-1970-kostas-georgakis