Greek Poems

A harmless diversion, a few poems about Greece...

Pythian Hymn to Apollo

Thou hast many temples and wooded groves,
And all the cliffs and towering peaks
Of the high mountains, and all sea-flowing rivers
And dear to thee, Apollo, but thou rejoices most
In Delos. Long-robed Ionians come
To honour thee with their children and gentle women.
Thou art delighted with boxing and dancing and song.
Whenever a festival is held in thy honour,
A man, seeing the Ionians gathered there,
Would say they were immortal, untouched by age.
he would remark their grace, and rejoice
At the sight of these men and the women with
beautiful girdles
And their swift ships and their endless wealth . . .

Friedrich Holderlin, THE ARCHIPELAGUS

Now Crete remains, and Salamis is green
In the darkening shade of her laurel leaves,
While Delos, crowned with a wreath of fiery rays,
Lifts her head, drunk with thought, to the sunrise,
And there are enough purple fruit on Tinos for everyone,
And in Chios too there is ripe fruit; the Cyprian liquor
Flows from the drunken hills; and from Calauria
The silver streams slip down to the sea
To the ancient waters of the Father.
All are living still, the islands, mothers of heroes,
Flowering from year to year . . .

Holderlin

O land of Homer!
By the scarlet cherry tree, or when
Sent by you in the vineyard I see
The young peaches hanging green,
And the swallow comes from afar, telling tales
While building his house on my walls,
Then, O Ionia, I dream of you,
In the days of May under the stars.
Therefore I have come, O islands, to see you . . .

1

What grief it would have been, my God,
What grief
If my heart was not consoled
By the hope of marble
And the prospect of a shining sunray
Which shall give new life
To the splendid ruins
Exactly like a red flower
Amid green leaves.

Nikos Engonopoulos From Street-Car and Acropolis
(le soleil me brule et me rend lumineux)

2 Santorin

Stoop if you can to the dark sea forgetting
The sound of a flute to naked feet
That trod in your sleep in the other the sunken life

Write if you can on your last shell
The day the name the place
And cast it to sink in the sea.

George Seferis Gymnopaedia

3

O shining white and famed in song and violet-wreathed,
Fortress of Hellas, glorious Athens, city of God

Anon

4 ‘As upon seacoasts’

As upon seacoasts when the gods
Begin to build and the work of the waves
Ships in unstoppably wave
After wave, in splendour, and the earth
Attires itself and then comes joy
A supreme, tuneful joy, setting the work to rights,
So upon the poem
When the wine-god points and promises
And with the darling of Greece,
Seaborn, veiling her looks,
The waves beach their abundance.

Friedrich Holderlin translated by David Constantine

5 Landscape

Here, in this mineral landscape
of rock and sea, sapphire and diamond,
which to the Wheel of Time offers nothing
that’s perishable;

here in the great victorious light
whose only stain is your own shadow,
and where only your body carries
a germ of death;

here perhaps for a moment the idols
will vanish; perhaps once again
in a dazzling flash you may stare
at your true self;

that self hidden by so many masks,
distorted by necessities and yokes,
which you betray, and everyone robs you
with violence and seduction.

Thus cleansed like an earthen jar
or bones stripped bare, your clay shall escape
for a brief moment the implacable weights
of life and of death.

Alexander Matsas

6 From ‘Glittering day, conch of that voice’

I spoke of love, of the rose’s health, the sunray
Which alone finds the heart straightway
Of Greece that walks the sea with surety
Of Greece which takes me on voyages always
To naked snow-glorious mountains

I give my hand to justice
Translucent fountain, spring on the mountain summit
My sky is deep and unchanging
Whatever I love is born unceasingly
Whatever I love is always at its beginning.

Odysseus Elytis

7 ‘O golden lyre’

O golden lyre, shared by Apollo with the Muses,
The violet-haired: the dancers and the choristers heed you,
And the singers obey your measures when,
Shaken by the music, you set the beat for the dance . . .
The arrows of music soothe the heart of the gods
By virtue of the wisdom of Apollo and the deep-girdled Muses.

Pindar

8 ‘Revere the Cyprian’

Revere the Cyprian. And I will breathe a fair wind
On you in love and over the bright-eyed sea.

Anon

9 Zante

0, my most beloved homeland, marvellous island, Zante! From you I
took my life, from you the gold gifts of Apollo . . .
Your air is perfumed, my dearest homeland, and enriches the sea
With the scent of golden lemons.
The king of the immortals has endowed you with heavy-laden
Vines, and light pure, transparent clouds . . .

Andreas Kalvos

10 From ‘Endymion’

A thing of beauty is a joy forever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing . . .

Keats

11 From ‘Amorgos’

And thus in a deep jar the grape shrivels and in the belfry of a fig tree the apple turns yellow
And thus flaunting a gay-coloured necktie
Under a grapevine bower the summer suspires
And thus naked among white cherry trees a tender love of
     mine lies sleeping
A girl as unwithering as a branch of almond
Her head resting on her elbow and her palm on her golden
     treasure
On its dawning warmth while slowly and softly like a thief
From the window of spring the Morning Star comes to awake her.

Nikos Gatsos

12 Drinking the Corinthian sun

Drinking the Corinthian sun
Reading the marble ruins
Striding over vineyard seas
Aiming with my harpoon
At votive fish that elude me
I found those leaves which the psalm of the sun memorizes
That living land which desire opens
With joy.

I drink water, cut fruit
Plunge my hand through the wind’s foliage
Lemon trees quicken the pollen of summer days
Green birds cut through my dreams
And I leave, my eyes filled
With a boundless gaze where the world becomes
Beautiful again from the beginning according to the heart’s
measure.

Odysseus Elytis

13 ‘Just a little more’

Just a little more
And we shall see the almond trees in blossom
The marbles shining in the sun
The sea, the curling waves.

Just a little more
Let us rise just a little higher.

George Seferis translated by Rex Warner

14 From The Odyssey

“Out in the dark blue sea there lies a land called Crete,
a rich and lovely land, washed by the waves on every side,
densely peopled and boasting ninety cities . . .”

The Odyssey, Book XIX, 172-4 translated by E.V. Rieu