Siesta – July 28, 2015

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

sleeping
in the early afternoon
siesta

under the pines
mid-summer siesta
with an ant

hot summer day
escaping the heat wave
afternoon siesta

love-making
behind the blinds in summer
then our siesta

© G.s.k. ‘15

Ah – the siesta!  The first thing one learnt when arriving for the first time to pass the summer in Italy was to take a siesta, whether you wanted to or not.  Usually after lunch, between two o’clock to four o’clock, the whole country came to a halt.  The shops, public offices, banks and most other public affairs closed down.  The cafes turned down the music, sometimes closing their doors as well and the streets became deserted.

The siesta though, wasn’t just napping!  It was the time of the day when you took a break from work, a time to sit back and relax during the hottest part of the day, have a proper lunch and be able to digest it.  I was down in Puglia a few years back and I was delighted to find that the tradition is still going strong in the south, though I’d grown out of the habit and had to re-adapt!

Now days, here in the north, except if one’s on vacation, the siesta has mostly been forgotten, like other traditional Italian ways of beating the heat, especially in the tourist areas.  Now the shops are always open sometimes into the late evening, the big supermarkets ad malls are open every day, and the thump thumping of disco music never stops!  Italy has become a modern country … like America.

summer siesta
memory of the past
childhood pass-time

 © G.s.k. ‘15

Written for: Carpe Diem #784 hirune (nap)