These are my English translations of poems and epigrams by the ancient Greek poet Callimachus aka Kallimachos. His surviving poems come from various sources including the Greek Anthology and the Garland of Meleager. The epigrams of Callimachus were so admired in antiquity that they became part of the school curriculum.
For Gail White, who put me up to these translations.
Here I lie, Timon, hateful as ever;
curse me as you go, but please go, wherever.
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Here Saon,
son of Dicon,
now rests in holy sleep:
don't say the good die young, friend,
lest gods and mortals weep.
—Michael R. Burch, after Callimachus
Once sweetest of the workfellows,
our shy teller of tall tales
—fleet Crethis!—who excelled
at every childhood game …
now you sleep among long shadows
where everyone’s the same …
—Michael R. Burch, after Callimachus
My friend found me here,
a shipwrecked corpse on the beach.
He heaped these strange boulders above me.
Oh, how he would wail
that he “loved” me,
with many bright tears for his own calamitous life!
Now he sleeps with my wife
and flits like a gull in a gale
—beyond reach—
while my broken bones bleach.
—Michael R. Burch, after Callimachus
Half my soul survives, but I don’t know whether Love or Death stole the remainder, only that it’s vanished, forever. Perhaps it flew back to the boys? And yet I often warned them, “Youngsters, don't let the vagabond in!” Now she flits and floats about, sick with love and fit to be stoned.
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Excerpt from “Hymn to Apollo”
by Callimachus
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
We have called him Phoibos and Nomios since he tended the yoke-mares of Amphrysos, fired with love for young Admetos. Lightly the cattle-herd waxed larger; nor did the flock’s she-goats lack kids under Apollo’s watchful eye; nor were the ewes barren without milk but all had lambs frolicking at their feet; and soon one would become the mother of twins.
Epikydes roams the hills, tracking every hare and hind through the frost and snow. But if someone says, "Look, here’s a wounded deer," he won’t touch it. And that’s how I am at love: wildly pursuing the fleeing game while flying past whatever lies available in my path.
Who are you, washed-up stranger? Leontichos found your corpse on the beach then carried you to this nameless tomb, sobbing for the fragility of life, since he too roams the seas like a gull.
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
To the Cup-Bearer
from “The Boyish Muse”
by Callimachus
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Decant the wine then toast "To Diokles!" Nor does the beautiful boy Achelous touch his hallowed ladlefuls. So beautiful the boy, Achelous, passing beautiful, and if any disagree, let me alone comprehend real beauty.
Pitiless ship, having borne away my life’s sole light,
I beseech you by Zeus, watchmaster of the harbor,
Return her!
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
They informed me of your death,
Heraklieitos,
and I wept with remorse
remembering how often we two had watched the sun set
on our discourse.
But although Death took all, he forgot one thing:
your Nightingales still sing,
nor can his foul hand ever touch them.
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
He stooped to strew flowers on his stepmother's tomb,
thinking she'd been changed for the better by her doom.
But he died when her monument landed on his head.
Moral: Stepmothers are dangerous, alive or dead.
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Flee the sea’s testy company,
mariner,
when the Kids are setting!
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
We buried Melanippus that morning; then at sunset his sister Basilo joined him; for she couldn’t bear to bury her brother and live; then their father Aristippus bewailed a twofold woe and all Cyrene wept to see a household of happy children left desolate.
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
All the Cyclades are Elysian islands,
but Delos shines like a poem in the sea;
she cradled and suckled Apollo,
the first to recognize him as a god.
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Halikarnassian, my dear friend,
although you lie elsewhere now,
reduced to mere ashes,
still your songs—your nightingales—survive;
nor will the underworld,
although it destroys everything,
ever touch them with its lethal hand.
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
“Wealth without goodness is worthless increase, while goodness requires substance.”—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
“A poet’s lies should at least be plausible.”—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
“A big book is a huge bore.”—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
“Excessive knowledge is unwieldy, while a man with a loose tongue is like a child with a knife.”
—Callimachus, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch