by phillipw | Jul 12, 2020 | AE, AN, BE, ES, HE, PO
No Room for Unholiness not Cleansed “ ‘What would a man not give,’declares Plato in the Apology, ‘to engage in conversation with Orpheus and Musaeus and Hesiod and Homer?’ Can we do something of the sort? If not to engage in conversation, then at least to glimpse...
by phillipw | Jul 12, 2020 | AM, AN, AR, MA, MU, PO, ST
Music, Poetry, and Architecture, All from Mathematics Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem The poet Amphion rebuilt the streets And temples, houses, and the stoa of The ruined Cadmeia. His lyric beats Were...
by phillipw | Jul 12, 2020 | AN, GR, PO, SA
Murmurs/Purling Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem [“Lo! I divine through murmurs borne The subtle thread of voices old” ~ Paul Verlaine, “Je divine, a travers un...
by phillipw | Jul 12, 2020 | DI, MI, PL, PO
Mixed Race Divinity and Humanity Socrates “builds up a picture of the poet as ‘a light, winged, holy creature’, who cannot compose until he is out of his mind and possessed . . . . The god takes away the poet’s senses, and uses him . . . so that the poems he utters...
by phillipw | Jul 8, 2020 | AN, CO, HU, PO, RH, SC
I Have Looked upon the Face of Jolliness The ancient Greeks in poetry were lewd As limericks, playful, silly as a stand Up joker on a comic’s platform, rude And crude, yep, far more rude than Russell Brand. Emitted from these ancient rhythmic throats Were poems...
by phillipw | Jul 7, 2020 | AN, PO, PR, RH
Heroes, Victims, and Poseidon The metre of ancient Greek poetry succeeds in “achieving a length and complexity that are unusual in the heroic verse of other literatures.” ~ Michael Grant, The Rise of the Greeks, 325, as quoted in Michael Schmidt, The First Poets, 16....