Thursday, May 21, 2015

. WALLS .











WALLS

Without consideration, without pity, without shame
they built great towering walls all around me.

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

for I had so many things to do outside.
Why didn’t I notice when they were building walls.

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

Constantine P. Cavafy
(Translation by David Connolly)








Sunday, May 17, 2015

. TO REMAIN .




TO REMAIN

It must have been one in the morning
or one-thirty.

      In a corner of the tavern;
behind the wooden partition.
The place was completely empty save for the two of us.
An oil-lamp provided scant light.
The drowsy waiter was dozing by the door.

No one would have seen us. Yet already
we were so aroused,
that we’d become incapable of caution.

Our clothes were half-open  -  not that there were many
for the divine month of July was blazing hot.

Pleasure of the flesh through
the half-open clothes;
quick baring of the flesh – the image of which
crossed twenty-six years; and has come now
to remain in this poetry.

(C.P. CAVAFY) Selected poems
Translated by David Connolly





Dedication to William Michaelian

Recently Banned Literature