"athenian" poems
A string of words that flow like the rivers,
Showing enough thought to provide the shivers.
Reflections of the poet within,
The type thrown out in the garbage bin
Or the type framed and hung on the wall.
There's a poet within us all.
Not all are eager to show their inner poet,
But would rather let it set sail
As rivers stream from their eyes
Due to the symbolic lie
They believe, making them pale
As, with their sorrow, they wallow it.
Patronizing executives and farmers
Believe their exterior would be shattered
If their inner poet let slip.
Once somebody gives them lip,
They harden as if it mattered
And equip their shields and armors.
The Spartan with the inner-Athenian
Would be killed by his friends
If they knew who he was on the inside.
This fills him with fear.
He keeps his ears open to hear
If anyone is coming as he hides
So his poetry will have its end
Before this war with the Peloponnesians.
Such beauty gone to waste
All because this facade of masculinity
Everyone puts on to protect themselves
From the beasts in this society
That would love to shatter those dreams.
Artists should gather in teams,
Ready to fight this anarchy
That would place our poetry on the shelves,
Collecting dust with haste.
Collecting dust with haste.
Nov 29, 2012
Nov 29, 2012 at 6:19 PM UTC
{Chorus.} Come praise Colonus' horses, and come praise
The wine-dark of the wood's intricacies,
The nightingale that deafens daylight there,
If daylight ever visit where,
Unvisited by tempest or by sun,
Immortal ladies tread the ground
Dizzy with harmonious sound,
Semele's lad a gay companion.
And yonder in the gymnasts' garden thrives
The self-sown, self-begotten shape that gives
Athenian intellect its mastery,
Even the grey-leaved olive-tree
Miracle-bred out of the living stone;
Nor accident of peace nor war
Shall wither that old marvel, for
The great grey-eyed Athene stareS thereon.
Who comes into this countty, and has come
Where golden crocus and narcissus bloom,
Where the Great Mother, mourning for her daughter
And beauty-drunken by the water
Glittering among grey-leaved olive-trees,
Has plucked a flower and sung her loss;
Who finds abounding Cephisus
Has found the loveliest spectacle there is.
because this country has a pious mind
And so remembers that when all mankind
But trod the road, or splashed about the shore,
Poseidon gave it bit and oar,
Every Colonus lad or lass discourses
Of that oar and of that bit;
Summer and winter, day and night,
Of horses and horses of the sea, white horses.
2.7k
We were lost under
an athenian skyline
and for the first time
in forever
I didn’t want to be found.
Apr 29, 2023
Apr 29, 2023 at 4:23 PM UTC
darling, loving me is falling apart with octobers and kissing your poems goodbye. it is watching autumns unfold while slipping into the tracks of a freight train. i will kiss your skin, all chapped lips and sweetened cigarettes, my hands on your neck, as if feeling the walls of an athenian ruin. i will be every distinctive silhouette in a film, every line in a song, every secret spilling gracelessly off your lips before you catch yourself. i will set you on fire and you will burn; all wide-eyed and irises made of the storm, beneath my feather light touches.
i have a proclivity for breaking hearts and you will find yourself neck-deep in whirl of heartbreaks and headlights — all moonstruck and confused. i will break you — destroy you, bit by bit, in the most elaborate, exquisite way, that you will know one thing, darling —
chaos has a tendency to look beautiful.
Oct 11, 2019
Oct 11, 2019 at 10:52 AM UTC
Axel, who never had a rocking horse, once rode a bright blue tricycle. He called it his ‘Athenian Rhapsody’. He loved to play the tuba in bed, and when he was feeling particularly happy, would sit on the loo in the outside shed, pants around his ankles oompa-pa’ing till the cows came home.
That was quite a while ago; the tuba and the tricycle have gone, yet he can still hear the triangle sound the bell made on his tricycle, and still remembers the scraping of the old keys on the ancient tuba.
Axel listens to old sounds very well (all the time): he loves Bach, Mendelssohn and Donovan. He loves to eat crumpets with honey and drink a large white mug of milky tea; it reminds him of summer fishing trips to Lake Eucumbine, mushrooms and gnats in the full-sun morning air, (he loves to talk fishing when he’s playing chess with Carl the orderly, often quoting from his favourite magazine, ‘Modern Fly Fishing’).
Axel was once an expert at fly fishing; tying the ‘super moonshadow’ to perfection (he named the fly after what he thought was a Donovan song, written by Cat Stevens).
When the hospital staff remember to buy him a new box, Axel loves to drink Lady Grey tea made from tea bags, he prefers tea bags, he feels that somehow they bring clearer definition to tea making.
Axel thinks a lot about definition, noting how the edges of his bed are very clearly defined by the clean-blue hospital blankets that drop suddenly to the ocean of the grey linoleum floor. He likes the smell of cleanblue, it’s somehow a new sea to sail and sometimes the feel of his favourite jumper when he was a boy: a definite edge of beginning and end. He knows that soon he’ll cross the floor-grey ocean, sailing under a white sheet. But this is not a thing Axel dwells on for very long, he prefers to think of such things as his next chess move and flirting with Miriam the night nurse.
—
Axel has just beaten Carl in a game of chess. He’s said goodnight to Miriam, a long quiet goodnight, a good long, good night. He won’t wake again, he senses this – and is peaceful.
When his last breath comes he hears; a faint scraping sound and a single precious note from a triangle bell on a bright blue tricycle.
They’re good sounds.
They are old sounds.
They bring him…
Sep 11, 2014
Sep 11, 2014 at 8:10 AM UTC
I can see it in the distance
It's the River they call Styx
An I can see the Boat Man
Waiting for me holding out his hand
Ahead is Charon’s long black boat
In it many souls of those that are dead
A rough unkempt Athenian ******
All dressed in brownish red
His filthy matted beard is uncombed
His eyes burn like hollow pits of fire
A steady glow off the riverbed
A deathly foul oder laced in his attire
What is it that you pay the Ferryman
When you know your pockets are bare
The two coins that are on your eyelids
Will be enough to pay your fare
May 13, 2014
May 13, 2014 at 1:07 PM UTC
This tomb hideth the dust of Aeschylus, an Athenian, Euphorion's son, who died in wheat-bearing Gela; his glorious valor the precinct of Marathon may proclaim, and the long-haired Medes, who knew it well."
On the Plain at Marathon
We stood in Darius’ way.
An outnumbered band of Athenians
who the Medians sought to slay.
They had first crushed the Ionians
Then put Eretria to the Torch.
Wherever Darius conquered
the bleeding earth was scorched.
Our Hoplites held the high Ground
and penned the Persians in.
For several days a stalemate reigned.
Neither side could win.
But when the Persians spit their force
and sailed on a friendly tide.
Our hand was forced
there was but one course
if Athens was not to die.
Our Phalanx moved against each wing
of the Median horde.
Though numerous, they were lightly armed
against our spears and swords.
We burned their ships and slew their men
Their Panic turned the tide.
Aeschylus seemed to be everywhere
urging on our side.
A Legend holds Pheidippides
To Athens then made haste
to proclaim: “Rejoice , We conquer!”
at the end of his last race.
Nov 30, 2011
Nov 30, 2011 at 8:39 PM UTC
VIII
Captain or Colonel, or Knight in Arms,
Whose chance on these defenceless dores may sease,
If ever deed of honour did thee please,
Guard them, and him within protect from harms,
He can requite thee, for he knows the charms
That call Fame on such gentle acts as these,
And he can spred thy Name o’re Lands and Seas,
What ever clime the Suns bright circle warms.
Lift not thy spear against the Muses Bowre,
The great Emathian Conqueror bid spare
The house of Pindarus, when Temple and Towre
Went to the ground: And the repeated air
Of sad Electra’s Poet had the power
To save th’ Athenian Walls from ruine bare.
1.3k
in traveling letters from you I feel that we too
could visit Barcelona, or a far off European museum
filled with righteous Athenian romances layered
with Greek sculptures. In lieu of studying
the curves of their form we’d rather find ourselves
taking in our bodies, yours being far more interesting,
forever, than those all beautiful, ivory, and headless.
When I receive Frank O’ Hara in mornings over coffee
rolling off your tongue and into a black roasted cloud;
I smell even the greyest of overcasts—- our bodies
pressing against solemn and still in some bright yellow
cab wedged between the bustling bikes and buses
of New York City. It is only appropriate because you are
as aesthetically striking as a skyscraper, because your mind
is as vibrant as every neon light guiding me like a
moth straight back into your shape.
When I receive Frank O’ Hara in our first apartment,
may it be ideal or busted, begin with one block of prose
framed against the entrance wall as the eggs cook
contrarily, its yoke the orange color of evening light.
Warm near the ashtrays centered for our guests filtering
to and fro. Small in pacts and lovely like neighborhood flowers.
We’ll press our bellies side by side, the corners of our bed
holding and map Madrid, or even further to Japan, with our
fingers tracing like constellations upon the rest of the empty
spatial plaster. Left that way for only his words and the rest
that is left between us; all that is naked and unspoken.
Nov 30, 2012
Nov 30, 2012 at 1:38 AM UTC
All things are woven together and the common bond is sacred, and scarcely one thing is foreign to another, for they have been arranged together in their places and together make the same ordered Universe. For there is one Universe out of all, one God through all, one substance and one law, one common Reason of all intelligent creatures and one Truth.
Frequently consider the connection of all things in the universe.
We should not say ‘I am an Athenian’ or ‘I am a Roman’ but ‘I am a citizen of the Universe.
Feb 20, 2015
Feb 20, 2015 at 9:29 PM UTC
When Cameron came to Stratford
he came in disguise,
afraid of the eyes accusing him,
he stood in the stadium
like an Athenian,
but we saw through his games
and Olympiad flames,
when Cameron came to Stratford
we buggered off to Crewe.
Feb 15, 2015
Feb 15, 2015 at 4:44 PM UTC
Born to sour temperament and political policy,
Weakness gleamed in tremor's slight,
To pale to be of Grecian ilk,
Thank Gods no country side in sight.
Now seven years the barracks beckons,
My Mother's pride sent to the stake,
Twenty three years for the pain in me,
No time for us soldiers to be fake.
Wonders of becoming that horrid equal,
A wife to take but no house to live,
Those whips a dear and cutting friend,
No muscle ever the chance to give.
Now thirty years we slot in perfectly,
So time again now doubled in blue robe,
Strong through beatings beautiful brutality,
We never Athenian but of Spartan abode.
Jun 3, 2016
Jun 3, 2016 at 8:29 AM UTC
the nobles cut off Rasputin's head, while the two in command of keeping Rasputin's head drunk multiplied and cut off the Romanov family's heads - and it snowed a serene symphony of snow as it did on a mime's piano - and Russian felt fed, and alive again... and those closest to the pigs' trough still bemoaned the events, on the centenary pinpoint in St. Petersburg.
i was in an Athenian brothel...
i know what ethnicity
entertained me... national pride?
if there ain't any kept with the
women... just forget the football
team performing to a gold standard
that might inspire families to stay
together or keep the children dreaming...
but of course... the Irish still have
their qualms about 3rd class on the Titanic
and the potato famine... and the English
asked Aladdin for a carpet to brush
their colonial past under it -
the Welsh? don't know, don't care -
the Scots? y'ir a haggen hag hag
dabbler in Yiddish and hang the lamb
gush of intestine as edible? pardon me
deep fried friend, 'e's from Mars...
no wonder it took him Colonel Cook
and some wacky Portugese Columbus
to create the global empire, upon which
the sun, never truly set, but upon which
the moon did settle from time to time,
to reverse it's fascist priority with a pinch
of panic that had no systematic authority -
or as the venom said:
the only thing worse than fascism is panic...
proof via Pompeii.
Jul 23, 2016
Jul 23, 2016 at 10:19 PM UTC
I don't believe that you will die
I believe that you will turn
into a night bird
an Athenian owl
a night bird
that chirps in my ear
who are you
where do you come from
where are you going
Dan Laurentiu, Mountolive
Aug 13, 2014
Aug 13, 2014 at 4:24 PM UTC
Xenophon of Athens (/ˈzɛnəfən, -ˌfɒn/; Greek: Ξενοφῶν,
Ancient Greek: [ksenopʰɔ̂ːn], Xenophōn; c. 430 – 354 BC)
was an ancient Greek philosopher, historian, soldier,
mercenary, and student of Socrates. As a historian,
Xenophon is known for recording the history of his time,
the late-5th and early-4th centuries BC, in such works as the Hellenica, which covered the final seven years and the aftermath
of the Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC), thus representing
a thematic continuation of Thucydides' History
of the Peloponnesian War. As one of the 'Ten Thousand',
Greek mercenaries, Xenophon also participated
in Cyrus the Younger's failed campaign to claim the Persian throne
from his brother Artaxerxes II of Persia and recounted the events in Anabasis, his most notable history. Like Plato (427–347 BC),
Xenophon is an authority on Socrates about whom
he wrote several books of dialogues (the Memorabilia)
and an Apology of Socrates to the Jury,
which recounts the philosopher's trial in 399 BC.
Despite being born an Athenian citizen,
Xenophon was also associated with Sparta,
the traditional enemy of Athens. His pro-oligarchic politics,
military service under Spartan generals
in the Persian campaign and elsewhere
and his friendship with King Agesilaus II
endeared Xenophon to the Spartans.
Some of his works have a pro–Spartan bias,
especially the royal biography Agesilaus
and the Constitution of the Spartans.
Xenophon's works span several genres
and are written in plain-language Attic Greek,
for which reason they serve as translation
exercises for contemporary students of the
Ancient Greek language. In the Lives and
Opinions of Eminent Philosophers,
Diogenes Laërtius observed that as a writer
Xenophon of Athens was known as the “Attic Muse”,
for the sweetness of his diction (2.6).
Nov 16, 2018
Nov 16, 2018 at 8:41 PM UTC
Lyrical Poet of Greece
flowing like gentle breeze
Born in island of ******
like dawning sun she beautifully rose
As the time flew
desecrating winds blew
leaving mere fragments of work
one complete but mere sixteen lines
So little is known for certain
Yet it does not discourage me to pen
Let this poem be a spark
let your curiosity leave a mark
She crafted words into a mystic Shape
once read there is no escape
She wrote of fragile personal moments
of her daughter and her female friends .
Even Plato acknowledged her beautiful lines
He even said these following lines
"Some say the Muses are nine: how careless!
Look, there's Sappho too, from ****** the tenth"
Solon an Athenian ruler heard her song
and wanted it to be taught along
when curious faces asked Him why
he replied "Because I want to learn it and die".
Her Face was was minted in coins
Portrait painted on vases
Syracuse honored her exile
by erecting a statue
showing words could transcend
her gender in the people's eyes .
Mar 5, 2016
Mar 5, 2016 at 11:13 PM UTC
you’re tall now and your elegant shoulders are
rolled back and your collarbone frames your diamond
pendant like a picture
you don’t always wear the athenian owl anymore
you’re a little past your own poetry
they’ll all say my
how you’ve grown
haven't you
May 14, 2014
May 14, 2014 at 6:13 PM UTC
*in the athenian ghetto i watched ****** junkies with buggies and babies, little children begging for few quid spare for the daddies to shoot up.*
wonderous in assertion is a statement
that begins with the prefix a-
and the affix -theism,
to simply say: a theology (of some sort),
usually democratic;
we believe in god the same way
we believe in human disorganisation
that wants to number ants
rather than lions, but cannot grasp
the hierarchy of the ant utopia
with the imploded reflection of nature
of the mother, the queen, the origin
having the highest status, and like in chess,
the king the shadow dwarf,
a pawn of foolery almost limbless.
Dec 13, 2015
Dec 13, 2015 at 4:55 AM UTC
When I heard people talk about Minotaur's they would always be wrong,
they would say his lower half took the shape of a bull, his upper a man,
if you thought this too don't worry it's a common misconception,
they would say he was created because Pasiphae fell for a bull,
although that is half right it is still wrong,
the Minotaur was a creature who's body was human and held the head of a bull,
he wasn't created just because Pasiphae fell for a bull,
he was created because Minos didn't sacrifice the bull Poseidon sent,
Poseidon forced Pasiphae to lust over the bull as punishment and bare its child,
the Minotaur was created in spite because Poseidon failed to get his way,
he was locked away and labeled as a 'Monster' just because he was different,
when one of Minos three children were killed he ordered 7 Athenian youths and maidens to be sacrificed to the Minotaur each year,
the Minotaur never asked for any of that, he was luck enough to get a name,
sure he was different but he was still a kid, he deserved the right to live like the rest,
in a home, with a bed, food, and family,
he didn't deserve to be feared and hidden away,
I'm happy Theseus slayed him, for he no longer had to live that life of misery.
Aug 28, 2024
Aug 28, 2024 at 10:01 PM UTC