Far Off
I should like to relate this memory ...
but it is so faded now ... scarecely anthing is left --
because it lies far off, in the years of my early manhood.
A skin as if made of jasmine ...
that night in August -- was it August? -- that night ...
I can just barely remember the eyes; they were, I think, blue ...
Ah yes, blue; a sapphire blue.
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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Tomb of the Grammarian Lysias
In the Beirut library, just to the right as you go in,
we buried wise Lysias, the grammarian.
The spot is beautifully chosen.
We put him near those things of his
that he remembers maybe even there:
notes, texts, commentaries, variants,
voluminous studies of Greek idioms.
Also, this way, as we go to the books,
we'll see, we'll honour his tomb.
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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King Dimitrios
When the Macedonians deserted him
and showed they preferred Pyrrhos,
King Dimitrios (a noble soul) didn't behave
-so they said-
at all like a king.
He took off his golden robes,
threw away his purple buskins,
and quickly dressing himself
in simple clothes, he slipped out-
just like an actor who,
the play over,
changes his costume and goes away.
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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The Window of the Tobacco Shop
They stood among many others
close to a lighted tobacco shop window.
Their looks met by chance
and timidly, haltingly expressed
the illicit desire of their bodies.
Then a few uneasy steps along the street
until they smiled, and nodded slightly.
And after that the closed carriage,
the sensitive approach of body to body,
hands joined, lips meeting.
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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The Windows
In these dark chambers here what weary days
I spend, walk up and down as in a maze
To find the windows.----Only to unclose
One of these windows will be some relief.---
But somehow windows this room hasn’t got,
Or I can’t find them. Perhaps I’ better not.
Perhaps the light would be another grief.
What fresh surprises ther might be, who knows?
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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To Call up the Shades
One candle is enough. Its gentle light
will be more suitable, will be more gracious
when the Shades arrive, the Shades of Love.
One candle is enough. Tonight the room
should not have too much light. In deep reverie,
all receptiveness, and with the gentle light—
in this deep reverie I will form visions
to call up the Shades, the Shades of Love.
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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As much as you can
And if you can't shape your life the way you want,
at least try as much as you can
not to degrade it
by too much contact with the world,
by too much activity and talk.
Try not to degrade it by dragging it along,
taking it around and exposing it so often
to the daily silliness
of social events and parties,
until it comes to seem a boring hanger-on.
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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In The Street
His attractive face a bit pale,
his brown eyes looking tired, dazed,
twenty-five years old but could be taken for twenty,
with something of the artist in the way he dresses
-the colour of his tie, shape of his collar
he drifts aimlessly down the street,
as though still hypnotized by the illicit pleasure,
the very illicit pleasure he's just experienced.
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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Melancholy Of Jason Kleander, Poet In Kommagini, A.D. 595
The aging of my body and my beauty
is a wound from a merciless knife.
I’m not resigned to it at all.
I turn to you, Art of Poetry,
because you have a kind of knowledge about drugs:
attempts to numb the pain, in Imagination and Language.
It is wound from a merciless knife.
Bring your drugs, Art of Poetry—
they numb the wound at least for a little while.
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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Morning Sea
Let me stop here. Let me, too, look at nature awhile.
The brilliant blue of the morning sea, of the cloudless sky,
the yellow shore; all lovely,
all bathed in light.
Let me stand here. And let me pretend I see all this
(I really did see it for a minute when I first stopped)
and not my usual day-dreams here too,
my memories, those images of sensual pleasure.
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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