Down in Tarpon Springs, Florida there’s an old guy, name of Gus. He’s crusty as stale bread, skin like jerky. Gus is from Kalymnos, a small island in the Aegean Sea. He comes from a long line of sponge divers. As a boy he dove naked with his Pappous and father. Pappous could hold his breath for five minutes under water. Their sponges were highly prized and used in Greek bath houses. Gus’s Uncle Ambrose died of what they now call “decompression sickness.” Many men died or became paralyzed from diving too deep and surfacing too quickly.

Diving lined Gus’s pockets with drachmas. He could afford to take his girl, Cosima, out for fine dinners and dancing. In ’56 he and Cosima married and came to America. Gus left his homeland, but not his profession. He came to Tarpon Springs on a quest for his beloved sponges, after hearing it was full of Greek fishermen and divers. Sadly, the red tide algae of ’47 had all but wiped them out. So Gus became a shrimper and waited for his sponges to return. It was to be a long wait.

He was fifty-seven when he returned to sponging. He and Cosima had raised their five children. His sons moved away saying diving was not in their blood. Now, at eighty-five, he doesn’t dive anymore, but still lives with kefi, taking his rig—Dimitroula—out every day with his small crew of divers.

I am one of those divers. My name is Niko. Diving is in my blood, as it is in my grandfather’s—my Pappous, Gus.

three spits for luck 

sponges strung 
off the starboard rail 

dockside sunset 
a bottle of retsina 
passed hand to hand 

*Traditional Greek folk song originally sung in the 1930s by Roza Eskenazi

—Tied for Third Place Winner of MacQ’s Cheribun Challenge #4

Terri L. French

formerly served on the Board of Directors of The Haiku Foundation. She is past Southeast Regional Coordinator for The Haiku Society of America and former editor of Prune Juice Journal of senryu and kyoka. Terri served on the editorial teams of Haibun Today and contemporary haibun online (aka cho).

She and her husband, Ray, and dog, Chaka, spent four years as full-time RVers and now make their home on a mountain in Huntsville, Alabama. Pulling Sunset is Terri’s travelogue of poetry and photography inspired by those adventures on the road. Her latest book, Kaleidoscope Dream, was published in 2025 by Red Moon Press.

Author’s website: https://www.terrilfrenchhaiku.com/

More on the Web: By, About, and Beyond

⚡ Solfeggio, cheribun story by Terri L. French in MacQueen’s Quinterly (Issue 25, September 2024); longlisted Finalist in MacQ’s Cheribun Challenge #2

⚡ Winging It, duostitch sequence (a rare form) by French in Issue 24 of MacQ (August 2024)

⚡ Vespertine Sun, haibun by Terri L. French in The Wise Owl Daily Verse (Week 1, September 2025)

⚡ Precipice, haibun by French in cho (Issue 18.3, December 2022)

⚡ Tongue-tied, haibun in cho (Issue 17.3, December 2021)

⚡ Tzur Hei HaOlamim, haibun story in Issue 5 of MacQ (October 2020)