Cavafy: Kimon's Story: Poems 137-140
Channel: cavafyinenglish
Date: 2011-06-09

Cavafy Poems 137-140

Adapted from the Greek & read by Charles Bryant

137. HE DIDN'T UNDERSTAND

"I read them, I understood them and I condemned them,"
wrote the idiotic emperor Julian, having perused,
from such a lofty height, our really rather clever
Homeric psalms, made by Apollinaris,
bishop, christian. Thus the imperial pagan's
oh so feeble attempt to put us down.
Immediately we scribbled back "You may have read,
but you did not comprehend. Had you comprehended,
you could hardly have condemned."
That put him in his place straight away!

138. KIMON'S STORY

After the death of my cousin Marylos
a poetical friend made this epitaph.
The poem speaks in the voice of the deceased
and as I read it I can hear again
the slow measured speech of my clever cousin
with something of the viper's hiss and slither.

"My ending's at the crest and apogee.
I exit on a surging, seething wave.
Hermoteles is my inseperable friend,
my loving one companion. These last days,
although he seems unworried, I can sense
his grief. I see tear-reddened eyes he seeks
to hide. While I pretend to sleep he sits,
a quietly sobbing sentinel, by the bed.
I feel his loving gaze upon me always.
We're of similar age, both twenty-three.
Fate might have horrendous things in store,
some worse than death. Should I live,
Hermoteles so easily could turn cold,
change his affections, leaving me bereft.
Dying now, I possess unending love."

The author of this moving versicle
knew I was related to the deceased.
What he did not know, and could not know,
was that Marylos and I, inseperable,
had grown up together like twin brothers.
I am devastated by this cruel poem.
Marylos in death escapes my malice
even though he took Hermoteles from me.
Should Hermoteles attempt to repossess
my heavily ransomed, widowed, orphaned heart,
Marylos' grinning spectre would interpose,
as if I could hear him singing from the grave
with something of the viper's hiss and slither:
"Are you happy now, sweet cousin Kimon?
Are you happy now he's yours again,
the beautiful Hermoteles? Now
you have no excuse to slander me more?"

139. SPARTANS

King Cleomenes of Sparta watched
his mother Cratesicleia warily.
How could he say it? How approach the subject?
Ptolemy of Egypt had agreed
to help the Spartans against the Achaean League.
As guarantee, Cleomenes should send
his regal mother and his royal children
across the sea to Alexandria,
pampered hostages to the Egyptian cause.

The old lady knew a thing or three.
Utterly unfazed, she smiled at him,
at his stammered explanation. "Don't you worry.
I'll go with the children willingly.
I'm only glad, at my age, I can serve
my country still, our splendid Sparta.
Humiliated? Me? Oh don't be wet!
We outdate the House of Lagos by an age.
These Ptolomies are newbies, born yesterday.
I come from an ancient Spartan line
and hardly care what Greek-Egyptians think,
Lagids, riffraff, Ptolemaic scum!"

140. 1909-11

His father a poor seaman
from one of the remoter Aegean islands,
he worked for a blacksmith; was shabbily dressed,
cast off remnants of other people's clothes,
strong broad hands filthy from constant labour.
Through interstices of torn shirt and trousers
came magical glimpses of rounded muscled thews
and warm brown moulded cavities of flesh.

After work the fancy often took him
to dress himself in something especially flattering
to adorn his wellset frame - a fine expensive tie
for Sunday wear (he liked to parade on Sunday),
a new shirt of unusual cut and colour;
to pay for which he'd sell to a passing stranger
for a small sum his rich athletic body.

In the long story of Alexandrian history
crammed as it is with coruscating beauty
never before was found such a fabulous creature.
Now he's gone, forgotten: except by me.
Dare I now admit it? Tasted sensually
upon my teeth and tongue.
No one ever photographed or drew
the exotic outline of his body, face or thew.

In time his loveliness faded, puffy and worn
from unremitting toil and indecency.
Like any old piece of metal he was thrown into the smithy
heated hammered beaten shaped or cast
into a handy and appropriate tool;
his strength and beauty gone,
tossed and lost among scrap metal clanging.