55 quotes
The greatest gods of our glorious Greece
appeared before you.
And if they left, don’t think for a minute
that they were frightened by a gesture.
Collected Poems (1992)
Nero wasn’t worried at all when he heard
the utterance of the Delphic Oracle:
“Beware the age of seventy-three.”
Plenty of time to enjoy himself still.
He’s thirty. The deadline
the god has given him is quite enough
to cope with future dangers.
Collected Poems (1992)
He who hopes to grow in spirit
will have to transcend obedience and respect.
He'll hold to some laws
but he'll mostly violate
both law and custom, and go beyond
the established, inadequate norm.
Collected Poems (1992)
And from this marvellous pan-Hellenic expedition,
triumphant, brilliant in every way,
celebrated on all sides, glorified
incomparable, we emerged:
the great new Hellenic world.
In The Year 200 B. C (1931)
He wasn’t completely wrong, poor old Gemistus
(let Lord Andronicus and the patriarch suspect him if they like),
in wanting us, telling us to become pagan once again.
Just to be on the first step
should make you happy and proud.
To have come this far is no small achievement:
what you have done is a glorious thing.
Collected Poems (1992)
The holy Cross goes forward; it brings joy and consolation
to every quarter where Christians live;
and these God-fearing people, elated,
stand in their doorways and greet it reverently,
the strength, the salvation of the universe, the Cross.
Collected Poems (1992)
He remembers impulses bridled, the joy
he sacrificed. Every chance he lost
now mocks his senseless caution.
Collected Poems (1992)
One candle is enough. Its gentle light
will be more suitable, will be more gracious
when the Shades arrive, the Shades of Love.
Collected Poems (1992)
When they saw Patroklos dead
— so brave and strong, so young —
the horses of Achilles began to weep;
their immortal nature was upset deeply
by this work of death they had to look at.
Collected Poems (1992)
Now the longed-for signal has appeared. Yet when happiness comes
it brings less joy than one expected.
But at least we've gained this much: we've rid ourselves
of hope and expectation.
Collected Poems (1992)
From my most unnoticed actions,
my most veiled writing —
from these alone will I be understood.
Collected Poems (1992)
The days of the future stand in front of us
Like a line of candles all alight —
Golden and warm and lively little candles.
Try to keep them, poet,
those erotic visions of yours,
however few of them there are that can be stilled.
Put them, half-hidden, in your lines.
Collected Poems (1992)
Things impolitic and dangerous:
praise for Greek ideals,
supernatural magic, visits to pagan temples.
Enthusiasm for the ancient gods
Collected Poems (1992)
I look before me at my lighted candles,
I don’t want to turn around and see with horror
How quickly the dark line is lengthening,
How quickly the candles multiply that have been put out.
From all I did and all I said
let no one try to find out who I was.
Collected Poems (1992)
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.
Collected Poems (1992)
That we’ve broken their statues,
that we’ve driven them out of their temples,
doesn’t mean at all that the gods are dead.
O land of Ionia, they’re still in love with you,
their souls still keep your memory.
Collected Poems (1992)
His friends weren’t Christians; that much was certain.
But even so they couldn’t play
as he could (brought up a Christian)
with a new religious system,
ludicrous in both theory and application.
They were, after all, Greeks. Nothing in excess, Augustus.
Collected Poems (1992)