by phillipw | Apr 8, 2020 | AN, BE, PO
Upon the Face of Agamemnon “and also he [King Priam of Troy] admires Agamemnon for his beauty” ~ Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae, XIII, 906 Forget that Helen for a moment. Think Of gorgeous men. The King of Troy could not Resist men’s beauty. Helen caused a stink That...
by phillipw | Apr 8, 2020 | CH, ST
A Journey A calmness settles, not a numbness. Trees I pass, that used to drip with pain and drop Their leaves in orange sorrow, only please With steadiness of green. They hold a crop Of new, or dark, or waving apples, leaves Or needles. Fields no...
by phillipw | Apr 8, 2020 | AN, EL
Hoot Elegies “Initially the elegy was not restricted to laments. On the contrary, there was the erotic elegy (brilliantly taken up by the Latin poet Ovid)” ~ Michael Schmidt, The First Poets, 11 In long gone centuries elegies were hot With sex. The...
by phillipw | Apr 8, 2020 | LO, LU, RO
Atheism “The lyric had functions in religious and other terms.” ~ Michael Schmidt, The First Poets, 10 So what has changed? Nothing really, except We now make lust itself a god, divine Without the need of Venus. We have swept The gods...
by phillipw | Apr 8, 2020 | AN
Scholarly Blindness “Since before 450 BC there was no prose literature, [sic] our only windows on the ancient world are the poems.” ~ Michael Schmidt, The First Poets, 8 It only goes to show that scholars love To focus narrowly. He looked so hard At...
