It was a joy to spend two weeks in this wild, but serene and ancient place, walking on shepherds’ paths and seeing goats, sheep, frogs, and gorgeous crows in the olive groves. The locals are very friendly if you know a few Greek words, which I found really fun. The water of the Evian Gulf is transparent, and there’s a lovely beach nearby with mountains in the distance. The house is spacious and old, but beautifully renovated.
Nikos and Georgia clearly care about food (a delicious Greek dish was delivered daily!) and about writers. They are true travelers with open minds and hearts who know the value of their own place and traditions. I felt well taken care of, but had plenty of space and time for writing. I’m working on a book of poems, and my time at La Casa Grande was very productive.
Hilary Sideris‘s poems have appeared in The American Journal of Poetry, Arts & Letters, Barrow Street,The Cortland Review, Connecticut Review, Fourteen Hills, Green Mountains Review, Gulf Coast, Poet Lore, Poetry Daily, Rhino, Quiddity, Salamander, The Southern Poetry Review, Southampton Review, Sugar House Review, Room, and Tar River Poetry, among others.
Her work appears in the anthologies Stronger Than Fear: Poems of Empowerment, Compassion, and Social Justice, edited by Carol Alexander and Stephen Massimilla, Pomegranate Seeds: An Anthology of Greek-American Poetry, edited by Dean Kostos, Token Entry: NYC Subway Poems, edited by Jerry LeFemina, and Rabbit Ears: TV Poems, edited by Joel Allegretti. She is the author of five poetry chapbooks: The Orange Juice Is Over (Finishing Line Press 2008), Baby (Pudding House Press 2009), Gold & Other Fish (Finishing Line Press 2011), Sweet Flag (Finishing Line Press 2013), and The Silent B (Dos Madres Press 2019), as well as five full-length collections: Most Likely to Die (Poets Wear Prada Press 2014), The Inclination to Make Waves (Big Wonderful Press 2016), Un Amore Veloce (Kelsay Books 2019) Animals in English, Poems after Temple Grandin (Dos Madres Press 2020), and Liberty Laundry (Dos Madres Press, 2022).
Hilary studied English Literature at Indiana University and received her MFA from The University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop. She works as a professional developer for the CUNY Start program at The City University of New York and lives in Brooklyn, NY.
You can follow Hilary here: http://www.hilarysiderispoetry.com & https://instagram.com/hilarysideris
Hilary spent two weeks at La Casa Grande in Agios Ioannis, Evia in mid May 2023.
