Tag Archives: Cavafy

Thermopylae

12 Saturday Mar 2016

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The comments on Jess’ posts lately have reminded me of this, which I think we should all take to heart.

Thermopylae

Honor to those who in the life they lead
define and guard a Thermopylae.
Never betraying what is right,
consistent and just in all they do
but showing pity also, and compassion;
generous when they are rich, and when they are poor,
still generous in small ways,
still helping as much as they can;
always speaking the truth,
yet without hating those who lie.

And even more honor is due to them
when they foresee (as many do foresee)
that in the end Ephialtis will make his appearance,
that the Medes will break through after all.

Cavafy

This was first published here on 24 Aug 2012 by Chalcedon451.

One of the great joys that this blog has brought to me personally is the renewed love of poetry that Jessica brought to me. And, you know, if often speaks to our problems, which remain the same problems they always have been.

I have read my dearest friend Jessica’s post this morning, Vale, and while I am saddened beyond measure, I am not even slightly surprised. I am, however, quite angry at those benighted souls who caused it. While I am not following her immediately, the only reason is the loyalty that I owe to Chalcedon451, who has become one of my best friends. But I must say, if the tone of the comment streams remains as it is, my days here are numbered as well.

Jess’ friend who looked in here, is also a friend of mine, and asked me as well, how I put up with “those bloody bloggers”? I had no answer. Takes a special sort of person to drive people out of the house they built, if that’s what a Christian is, I’m not very sure that I wish to be one, either.

The God abandons Antony

08 Thursday Nov 2012

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Yesterday’s post by Jess and the responses prompt this, from Cavafy:

When suddenly, at midnight, you hear
an invisible procession going by
with exquisite music, voices,
don’t mourn your luck that’s failing now,
work gone wrong, your plans
all proving deceptive—don’t mourn them uselessly.
As one long prepared, and graced with courage,
say goodbye to her, the Alexandria that is leaving.
Above all, don’t fool yourself, don’t say
it was a dream, your ears deceived you:
don’t degrade yourself with empty hopes like these.
As one long prepared, and graced with courage,
as is right for you who proved worthy of this kind of city,
go firmly to the window
and listen with deep emotion, but not
with the whining, the pleas of a coward;
listen—your final delectation—to the voices,
to the exquisite music of that strange procession,
and say goodbye to her, to the Alexandria you are losing.

Farewell to the America I have loved all my life. Whilst it lasted, it was the glory of the age. We shall not see its like again. When the barbarians feast in the Senate, we shall look back with useless longing.

Thermopylae

24 Friday Aug 2012

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Rather than begin the Newman series on obedience whilst Jessica’s discussion is on-going, I have postponed it for one more day to offer another poem from Cavafy.

The great Alexandrian poet was the descendant of those Greeks who had settled in Egypt in the time of the Ptolemies, and was steeped in classical Greek culture. His take on the Spartans at Thermopylae seems well worth sharing. Every group of heroes is vulnerable to its Ephialtis, who was the Greek who showed the Persians the way across the mountains to get at the Spartans from the rear. The reaction to such moments defines men. That Cafavy captures to perfection here:

Honor to those who in the life they lead
define and guard a Thermopylae.
Never betraying what is right,
consistent and just in all they do
but showing pity also, and compassion;
generous when they are rich, and when they are poor,
still generous in small ways,
still helping as much as they can;
always speaking the truth,
yet without hating those who lie.

And even more honor is due to them
when they foresee (as many do foresee)
that in the end Ephialtis will make his appearance,
that the Medes will break through after all.

Ithaka

23 Thursday Aug 2012

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Cavafy’s The Barbarians was appreciated as part of Jess’s conversation with those of you who comment and read here. So, I took the liberty of postponing the Newman series on obedience for another of this great poet’s works – possibly my own favourite – Ithaka. There is the most marvellous rendering of it by Sean Connery here: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1n3n2Ox4Yfk&feature=related 

– its relevance to your conversation will, I hope, be clear

ITHAKA

 

As you set out for Ithaka
hope the voyage is a long one,
full of adventure, full of discovery.
Laistrygonians and Cyclops,
angry Poseidon—don’t be afraid of them:
you’ll never find things like that on your way
as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,
as long as a rare excitement
stirs your spirit and your body.
Laistrygonians and Cyclops,
wild Poseidon—you won’t encounter them
unless you bring them along inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up in front of you.

Hope the voyage is a long one.
May there be many a summer morning when,
with what pleasure, what joy,
you come into harbors seen for the first time;
may you stop at Phoenician trading stations
to buy fine things,
mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
sensual perfume of every kind—
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
and may you visit many Egyptian cities
to gather stores of knowledge from their scholars.

Keep Ithaka always in your mind.
Arriving there is what you are destined for.
But do not hurry the journey at all.
Better if it lasts for years,
so you are old by the time you reach the island,
wealthy with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka to make you rich.

Ithaka gave you the marvelous journey.
Without her you would not have set out.
She has nothing left to give you now.

And if you find her poor, Ithaka won’t have fooled you.
Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,
you will have understood by then what these Ithakas mean.

C.P. Cafavy

Walls – and their ending

22 Wednesday Aug 2012

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I just want to say something because I think my heart will explode if I don’t, and that is to thank all of you who are commenting. Those comments speak of a generosity of spirit, a love of Christ and a desire to know Him more nearly and love Him more dearly, that by themselves they light a way forward.

It is surely in such a spirit and in such love and such respect for each other that we exhibit whose children we are. I can’t help, naive though I am, but think that if there were more of this expressed by more Christians, then the tide of battle would turn.

My co-author has a great fondness for the Alexandrian poet, Cavafy. I remember him reading this to me many years ago, and it seems apt here and now:

Walls

Without consideration, without pity, without shame
they have built great and high walls around me.

And now I sit here and despair.
I think of nothing else: this fate gnaws at my mind;

for I had many things to do outside.
Ah why did I not pay attention when they were building the walls.

But I never heard any noise or sound of builders.
Imperceptibly they shut me from the outside world.

Waiting for the Barbarians

22 Wednesday Aug 2012

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In view of the current topics in Jessica’s part of the blog, I am holding back the first of a series of extracts from Newman on ‘obedience’, as I think this poem from the Alexandrian poet, Constantine Cavafy (1863-1933). I think the reader will see why.

Waiting for the Barbarians

What are we waiting for, assembled in the forum?

The barbarians are to arrive today.

Why such inaction in the Senate?
Why do the Senators sit and pass no laws?

Because the barbarians are to arrive today.
What laws can the Senators pass any more?
When the barbarians come they will make the laws.

Why did our emperor wake up so early,
and sits at the greatest gate of the city,
on the throne, solemn, wearing the crown?

Because the barbarians are to arrive today.
And the emperor waits to receive
their chief. Indeed he has prepared
to give him a scroll. Therein he inscribed
many titles and names of honor.

Why have our two consuls and the praetors come out
today in their red, embroidered togas;
why do they wear amethyst-studded bracelets,
and rings with brilliant, glittering emeralds;
why are they carrying costly canes today,
wonderfully carved with silver and gold?

Because the barbarians are to arrive today,
and such things dazzle the barbarians.

Why don’t the worthy orators come as always
to make their speeches, to have their say?

Because the barbarians are to arrive today;
and they get bored with eloquence and orations.

Why all of a sudden this unrest
and confusion. (How solemn the faces have become).
Why are the streets and squares clearing quickly,
and all return to their homes, so deep in thought?

Because night is here but the barbarians have not come.
And some people arrived from the borders,
and said that there are no longer any barbarians.

And now what shall become of us without any barbarians?
Those people were some kind of solution.