The Man Who Never Wanted to Leave

Henry Miller and the Canal That Changed Everything

In the summer of 1939, an American writer named Henry Miller arrived in Greece. He was broke, tired, and not sure what he was looking for. What he found, among other things, was Poros.

Miller is best known for books that got him banned in America for decades. But the book he himself considered his greatest work was about Greece — *The Colossus of Maroussi*, written in 1941. And some of the most alive pages in that book are about this island.

He arrived by boat, the way most people did then. As the vessel moved through the narrow canal between Poros and the Peloponnese — the same canal you cross today — something happened to him.

He wrote:

"I don't know which affected me more deeply — the story of the lemon groves just opposite us or the sight of Poros itself when suddenly I realized that we were sailing through the streets."

Sailing through the streets. That's exactly what it feels like. The canal is so narrow that the houses on both sides feel close enough to touch from the deck of a boat. The water is calm. The town rises up the hill in front of you. It's unlike any arrival you've ever made anywhere.

Miller stayed. He spent months here, walking the same streets you walk today, eating, talking, watching the light on the water. Poros got under his skin in a way that few places ever do to a person.

He wrote this about leaving:

"I will cling to Poros… if I should ever have the choice of attaining Nirvana or remaining behind to watch over and guide those to come, I say now let me remain behind, let me hover as a gentle spirit above the roofs of Poros and look down upon the voyager with a smile of peace and good cheer."

The roofs he wrote about are still there. The canal is still there. The lemon groves across the water in Galatas are still there.

Some places do that to people. They arrive not knowing what they were looking for, and they find it here.

Maybe you know the feeling.