Delphi, Greece, May 15th, 2005

Published in the Journal, The Greek and Cypriot Notebook

The cold door, a candle
burning in the shrine
the way a snowflake
spins—

* * *
It had been a long drive to Delphi and we were still driving late into the night, and I was sitting by myself on the bus, looking down a valley of scrub between the road and the Corinthian Bay, wondering how archeologists knew where to dig for ancient Greek sites. From folk stories, I imagined, and oral histories. And literature. And a name appeared in my head, surprising me: “Like Plato.” And I thought, “No, that’s not right—not Plato—he didn’t write history.” And at that moment Layne stood up in the front of the bus and said, “Randy, have you read Plato: Neo-historian? It’s about how Plato was really writing a history of the previous 8000 years.”