Athos poems on Hello Poetry

Johnny Noiπ Jan 2019

Market Jerome's Love night,                                White House Black
& diverse; writing part-time city not Mary,                                 Star
of the looting,  the present and the mother:                                 Red,
Green idol of Night,
         shipbuilding in Australia & in Africa,
women were three beautiful girl's mothers;
and Europe, eg industry or the new the way
to the back, the son of South Africa, therefore,
Ezra, and John saw this, jewelry, ornaments,
and the sky over Greece, the best rust is black,
Germany, Germany, Germany's territory
of the judgment, and money, Chan crisis:
When he speaketh of Guy,       was the reason
of the word of the girl and the ox in the same
yesterday, in favor of the culture
of the metropolis of changing the form
in fiquidem for Google in Germany,
his wife should be given. Sleep in the capital
and were present Germany # mauris number
of websites that can play, Dragon fund Spain
donations legend of Italian film theft theft of
natural Because of this choice,             and a stone monument,
Saturday, and in Europe,                                     and in the last
hour lens, the cow in the winter forest
bonds with face dreams and was immortal.
Empire trying to enter the information
was swimming Kaisissa's ID number;
Soil, wild peacock, organic music,
fire describes a conductor, Susaniza, Brazil,
unfortunately, stories, dreams,             and from the conference welcome,                                              knowledge
and good health. **-commerce
is *******,                                           in the dream of the good in the sky,
nature, and state analysis,
the history of Egyptian history's
unique flavor, today's trend. The old cat is a part
of a window in a basket,       I was let in by a fundraiser:                                  the introduction
of, and the angel,  he who does not is blue
hipokretasa, the poet, according
to the section,                                          itasaraitinepinasivi,
dressed in slacks and a mirror
of cylinders are gray,                              and the shoes part of the furniture.
And a large public communication
such as the BK Arereniciaecaica man,
yrir boot in the world to buy B WAP-eight
calories, you might try a new culture
and the musicians and the cycle (1) 2 1 2 3 4 5 ... 12: 12 (345 ) 345;
alavasa                           Spanish spices city that is?                   The Mount
Agung in the mountains,
in the mountains, in the mountains,                                        the mountains,
agave can render a reason, AG, AG,           Agung the mountains, the river,
the mountain of Agung in the mountains,
                                      in the mountains,
in the mountains, the mountains,                    aigaga the mountain of Sinai,
the mountain of the covenant of the AG,
Mountain Fields shall agegagana                  And all the mountain of Sinai,
                                                And the whole of mount Sinai, the mountain
of Sinai, in the mountains, the clouds,
the mountains, in the mountains, in the mountains,          in the mountains,
tura, Turkey, the Hararite,                                                        the mountain
of the olive trees, out of the. . .         Mountain
AG, Attorney General, the Minister of Justice,
Attorney General, Attorney C.,    Mount Sinai
Mount Sinai, the mountain, the mountain;
CATAMITE:  Mountain aingali Mountain,      Mountain
Mount
Agung in the mountains Mountain View
Ag,    Mount Mount Mount Mount Mount Mount Mount
Mount Mount Mountain Mountain
range AG ajibia Edge AG,              Aga Khan
Mountain,   Agung arrived at the white house,                            while Mary,
the mother of the left AF market,                                        the Green Knight
statue, Afro Isanebazam, air end to his woman,
the ****** Mary 3,    beautiful water in Europe,
America, South Africa,             Ezra and John's
taut equipment,
energy, communication, concrete,
Greece, paradise convex base black, yurarama
of German history,
the way the ground of Laura's members enjoy.                                      Roads,
for example, as in the Old Church,                       for example midalaitavana,
Chandler was a poor start at the beginning
of the Gay laikabi works,                                                  Rimen kapaitaleara
their food and oxygen to the public interest,
axes and Metastasis in Germany,                                             but the beauty
of Google's wife on the third floor,
to support his party,                                             and brought him to his own
wife, and his wife,                                                        Jerome's Love Market
is a different Lady's writing,                                                   where the stars
have been kidnapped at night from the Black House;
city and now the mother was not red,                                  green night now,
Avon, shipbuilding, Australia, Africa,
women and mother's three women;
And both in Europe and in industry
and in the new ride, so South African
son, Ezra and John, jewelry,                                                          ornaments
                          and heaven,
Greece, the best rust, black,
Germany, Germany,                         the simplicity of the crisis in Germany,
says why he has friends,
how German woman and **** Gore,
giving the city a fiquidem form. Websites
that provide Dragon Dragon Dan Dan
with a fictional film took part in the native
German film n# Edit the head
and stone memorial on Sunday and Europe,
and the hour and hour of the last hour
of the fleet of lenses and games.                                          your dreams
and immortality in jungle rings
in winter. This statement showed me
that this zodiac showed me
in very gentle conditions that swam.                                    Soil, natural fires,
organic music, description of drivers' fire,
Brazil, unfortunately, stories,
dreams and conferences,              susaniza
materials and health information.
A lot of trade is characterized by a dream
in nature,                                             nature and analysis,                                              Egyptian history,
unique taste,                       the history of today's trend.
Presentation of the object
of the file to the gutter pile,   according to the mirrors
of the gray and moving cylinders,
messenger,     Blue Hippocampus
Market Definitions:
Regular collection of vocabulary
for buying and selling stocks,
animals and other goods. . . eg business. . .
Market sales in the US market continue. . .
List traders declare merchant market,
grocery supermarket facility authority
Flees Commodity Market Market,
Market Market Market gcréiféire:
good flat layers announcing cucumber
groceries market market market. Soil,
Wild Peacock, Biological Music, Fire
Description, Pipeline, Susanija Brazil,
Unfortunately Stories,                                                    Dreams and Welcome
Conferences, Knowledge
and Good Health; **-Trade is also a difficult,                                      trendy
and trendy trend.                                          The old cat is part of the window,
the ball which is according to the section
is part of the balloon and furniture.                               BK Mary Aranianika,
I want to buy the world BAP-8 calories
so that you can buy culture and the new cycle
(1) 2 1 2 3 4 5 ... 12: 12 (345) 345 characters is less Spanish
masala; Mountains, mountains, mountains,
mountains, mountains, mountains, mountains,
mountains, mountains, mountains, mountains,
mountains, Mount Sinai, Mount Agagna
and Mountains, Mount Sinai Mountains,
mountains, mountains, mountains -  turquoise,
turkey, harari, olives, offshore. Mountain
AG, Attorney General, Justice Minister,
Attorney General, Prospector Sea Mount Sinai,
Mount Sinai,   Mountain, Mountain, Mountain
Mount Athos, Mount Athos, Mount Athos,
Mount Athos, Mount Athos, Mount Athos,
Mount Mount, Athos Mountain, Mount Athos;
Mountain Mount Athos Mount Agros;
AG Agri Edge AG,                        Agh Han
Mountain Agung came to the White House,
while his mother EFT in the AE market,
Europe, America John Knight Statue
in South Africa, Ezra,   and John Tower
Equipment, Energy,
Communication, Concrete, Greece,
Black Convex base, base yurarama
on German history,              how they enjoy
parishioners.
For example, in the former church,
for example, he was a poor female
Chandler, the first female gay,                  who worked for food
and public interest scenes
in the Cappola Reel, man,                         and now the ship
building industry,
third floor in Australia, Africa On.
In Germany, Germany, Germany,
Germany, Germany, Germany,
Germany, South Africa, he asks friends
about how to speak German,       which
gives the city a bold look.         Dragon Dragon's magnificent dragon dancers
                         are shown
                         in the German film,                                         #Dada the Head
and Stone Memorial on Sunday and in Europe.                                  Inability
for the jungle rings in your dreams and winter.
I have shown this statement in very clear
climatic conditions. Terrain, Fire, Biological
Music, Car Driver, Fire, Brazil,         Lugood,
Dreams and Susaninja need Conference
and Health Information;    Many transactions
with nature,           nature and analysis
in the history of current trends.             Show
the drain to the messenger,
horseshoe blue,      routine moving cylinders
Below are the individual definitions
of sales,   sales of animals and other
items. The market of market sales
in the USA. UU: He continued to expand
his market, where the retail stores
that sell groceries from the field
will be announced. The biological music
of the wild world of the peacock,
the electric radio, Susan Brazil, the debate
about Drimvivr and dreams,               science and health
are difficult to participate in the establishment of a part.
That the Bride is a part of the window made of balloons,
that is based on a part of the furniture.
Chapter Aranianika:                    -8 calories of the world
wants to buy BAP in a culture
and cycle (1) 2 1 2 3 4 5 ... 12: 12 (345)
345 that do not speak Spanish;                       Mountains,
hill hill hill hill hill hill hill,                             mountain,
mount Sinai, Mount Sinai,        and pirigenic mountains,
mountain, turquoise, turkey,                        linseed hrari,
olive on the high seas.
Mount Athos, Mount Athos,                   Mount Perivoli
Perivoli Perivoli Perivoli,       Perivoli Perivoli Perivoli
mountain; Mount Athos           Mount Athos White AF,
energy industry of mother
AE, traveling in Europe, USA.
UU John Knight, South Africa,      Ezra and the tower of carrots,        energy and communication stop,                                                darkness,
                                                                                              the base is hollow,
for example, when an old church,                                                 for example,
       is a poor Gastrolobium close
to the first homosexual marriage,
and the need for food and scenes
favorite of the public in the work
of Kopala rhyme and perhaps,
three in Australia, and Africa.
Germany, Germany Germany
Germany Germany Germany
at a great cost, may not be in winter.
I saw written in plain text.   Electric,
electronic,
electrical,           electronic, electric,
Brazil, Lula is a god and the sadness
of their dreams,                                                   and Susanija are not arguing.
They are changing the status quo,                            the simulation technique
of progression and MD's historical research.
The transition to personalized definitions
to explain the angels of sand grains,                                              the modern
business space and a dictionary.                                                        However,
note that he testified that he lives
in the purchase and sale of products
and other animals.                                                   Buy the US market;
UU Continue in Marketing,                            where grasslands expand
Spencer Flama operations,                               Raw materials buy, buy,       buy the sheets.                        It is powerful,
and has the forest to burn
with the peacock, Organic Music,   Electricity and Detail,
Hydraulics and Susana,   Brazil's                 unique history
and the advice of your dreams.                       I would like
to know and rehearse it in Health.                     In general,
the problem is that I can share it.
The old cat is part of the window,
it is based on a part of the ball,
and the furniture with balloons.                    I want to buy
an Aranianika cap, my world BAP of -8
placed calories that you can have a culture and cycle (1)
2 1 2 3 4 5 ... 12: 12 (345) 345 Spanish
not only to buy spices?                   Mountains hill hill
hill hill hill hill hill hill hill, a mountain,
mountain along the Sinai mountains,
mountain and a row of olive trees on
it. Mount Athos Mount Athos Mount,
Mount Athos, Mount Athos, Mount Athos
Mount Athos; Mount Mount Athos Mount
Athos; Mount Athos, Mount Athos Mount
Mount, Mount Mount Mount Mount
Athena, Athena, Athena Mountain,
Mountain; White House; ARE Red John,
Knight of Europe; American citizens
in South Africa, Ezra products and the tower of energy & communication,
attitude,        Greece's curved black base
yurama, German history,                                          instead of parishioners.
For example, in the old church,       for example,           that a poor woman who worked for a Gastrolobium
near the first stage of the favorite food
Kopala rhyme in public,                                        in the energy department,
and the third is in Australia, South Africa.
Germany Germany, Germany, Germany,         Germany, Germany is the best performance of the German Dragon #
important to build the Temple of the Sun
and in Europe and the Stone Memorial.                                   At a great cost,
individuals cannot be in the winter.
The document looked at certain reports.
Flames conducted Below are the individual
definitions of sales and selling,                                animals and other items. The US market purchase sales market
continued to expand its market retail
stores selling groceries from the field
to be announced.
World wild Peacock's Biological music,
Electric Radio,
Susan Brazil,               Drimvivr and dreams
discussion,     science and health
is difficult             to participate in establishing a share.
                            That the Bride is a part
                            of the window,
                            billions made of which is founded
                            in a part of the furniture.
Chapter Aranianika:  -8 calories of the world wants
to buy BAP placed in a culture,
and the cycle (1) 2 1 2 3 4 5 ... 12: 12 (345)        345 non-Spanish speakers; Mountains hill hill hill hill hill hill hill hill,
mountain, Mount Sinai Mount Sinai
and Pyrogenic mountains, mountain, turquoise,                                 turkey,
hrari linseed, olive offshore.
Mount Athos, Mount Athos, Mount
Perivoli, Perivoli, Perivoli, Perivoli,
Perivoli, Perivoli Perivoli; mountain,                                                Mount Athos,                                          Mount Athos;
White AF, AE mother's energy industry,                         traveling in Europe,
USA John Knight, South Africa, Ezra,
and towering carrots, energy,
and communication stops,                                                 dark, hollow base,
for example,                                               w hen an old church for example,
                                                                                    is a poor Gastrolobium
close to the first gay marriage,
and the need for food                                                and the public's favorite
scenes in the Kopalariman job
and maybe three in Australia and in Africa.                                    Germany
Germany, Germany, Germany, Germany,                           Germany at great cost,                                                            he may not be in the winter time.
I saw written in plain text.
Electrical, Electronics, electrical,                                               Electronics,
electrical Brazil,
Lugosi,      and the sorrow of his dreams
and is no disputing Susanija
are changing the status quo,
MD simulation technique of progression
and historical research.     The transition
to customized definitions to explain
the angels of sand grains of sand,
modern business space and a dictionary.                                               Notice,
however, testified that he lives by buying
and selling products, and other animals.
Buy the US market continues to Market
Marketing where pastures Expands
Operations; Spencer flame Commodities
buy buy buy sheet! Cell
gcréiféire market to sell the store
has announced that it is.       It is mighty,
and have the forest to burn with the
peacock's Organic Music, Electricity &
Details, Hydraulics,            and Susana, Brazil,
unique history, and the counsels
of his dreams, he wishes he knew it,                                       and rehearsed it
in the Health, in general, the problem is,                        that I may share in it.
The old cat is part of the window
is based on a part of the ball,                                    and the balloon furniture.
I want to buy a cap Aranianika
my -8 world;                        BAP placed calories that you can have a culture,
and the cycle (1) 2 1 2 3 4 5 ... 12: 12 (345) 345;
Spanish not only to buy up spices?                                                  Mountains
hill hill hill hill hill hill hill hill hill
hill,                                       a mountain,                  Mountain along the Sinai mountains,                                                 mountain,
and a row of olive trees over it.                                                              Mount
Athos, Mount Athos, Mount
Mount Mount Mount Athos Mount,Athos                                                        Mount
Athos Mount Mount Mount Mount                                                        Athos,
Mount Athos Mount Athos, Mountain
Mount Mount Mount Mount Mount
Athena, Athena,      Athena Mountain,     mountain,                                         White House ARSSed, John knighted, Europe;                                              US citizens
in South Africa, Products of Ezra and the tower,                              energy &
                                                                                                 communication,
attitude, Greece,                                                                      curved
black Base yurama; German
history,               rather than parishioners.                                    For example,
in the ancient church, for example,                                    that a poor woman
who worked for a Gastrolobium
close to the first stage of her favorite
food, Kopolare, man in public, in the
department of energy, and the third
is in Australia, South Africa.
Germany Germany, Germany,
Germany, Germany, Germany
is the best performance of the German
Dragon: # important to build the temple
of the sun, and in Europe           and
                         the Stone Memorial.
                        At great cost, individuals
                        can be interred,
                        but not
                        in the winter.                                                The document
                        looked
                       at certain reports.
                                                                                             Driven by flames...

Homer

The Homeric Hymns: 3- To Apollo

III. TO APOLLO (546 lines)

TO DELIAN APOLLO --

(ll. 1-18) I will remember and not be unmindful of Apollo who
shoots afar.  As he goes through the house of Zeus, the gods
tremble before him and all spring up from their seats when he
draws near, as he bends his bright bow.  But Leto alone stays by
the side of Zeus who delights in thunder; and then she unstrings
his bow, and closes his quiver, and takes his archery from his
strong shoulders in her hands and hangs them on a golden peg
against a pillar of his father's house.  Then she leads him to a
seat and makes him sit: and the Father gives him nectar in a
golden cup welcoming his dear son, while the other gods make him
sit down there, and queenly Leto rejoices because she bare a
mighty son and an archer.  Rejoice, blessed Leto, for you bare
glorious children, the lord Apollo and Artemis who delights in
arrows; her in Ortygia, and him in rocky Delos, as you rested
against the great mass of the Cynthian hill hard by a palm-tree
by the streams of Inopus.

(ll. 19-29) How, then, shall I sing of you who in all ways are a
worthy theme of song?  For everywhere, O Phoebus, the whole range
of song is fallen to you, both over the mainland that rears
heifers and over the isles.  All mountain-peaks and high
headlands of lofty hills and rivers flowing out to the deep and
beaches sloping seawards and havens of the sea are your delight.
Shall I sing how at the first Leto bare you to be the joy of men,
as she rested against Mount Cynthus in that rocky isle, in sea-
girt Delos -- while on either hand a dark wave rolled on
landwards driven by shrill winds -- whence arising you rule over
all mortal men?

(ll. 30-50) Among those who are in Crete, and in the township of
Athens, and in the isle of Aegina and Euboea, famous for ships,
in Aegae and Eiresiae and Peparethus near the sea, in Thracian
Athos and Pelion's towering heights and Thracian Samos and the
shady hills of Ida, in Scyros and Phocaea and the high hill of
Autocane and fair-lying Imbros and smouldering Lemnos and rich
******, home of Macar, the son of ******, and Chios, brightest of
all the isles that lie in the sea, and craggy Mimas and the
heights of Corycus and gleaming Claros and the sheer hill of
Aesagea and watered Samos and the steep heights of Mycale, in
Miletus and Cos, the city of Meropian men, and steep Cnidos and
windy Carpathos, in Naxos and Paros and rocky Rhenaea -- so far
roamed Leto in travail with the god who shoots afar, to see if
any land would be willing to make a dwelling for her son.  But
they greatly trembled and feared, and none, not even the richest
of them, dared receive Phoebus, until queenly Leto set foot on
Delos and uttered winged words and asked her:

(ll. 51-61) 'Delos, if you would be willing to be the abode of my
son "Phoebus Apollo and make him a rich temple --; for no other
will touch you, as you will find: and I think you will never be
rich in oxen and sheep, nor bear vintage nor yet produce plants
abundantly.  But if you have the temple of far-shooting Apollo,
all men will bring you hecatombs and gather here, and incessant
savour of rich sacrifice will always arise, and you will feed
those who dwell in you from the hand of strangers; for truly your
own soil is not rich.'

(ll. 62-82) So spake Leto.  And Delos rejoiced and answered and
said:  'Leto, most glorious daughter of great Coeus, joyfully
would I receive your child the far-shooting lord; for it is all
too true that I am ill-spoken of among men, whereas thus I should
become very greatly honoured.  But this saying I fear, and I will
not hide it from you, Leto.  They say that Apollo will be one
that is very haughty and will greatly lord it among gods and men
all over the fruitful earth.  Therefore, I greatly fear in heart
and spirit that as soon as he sets the light of the sun, he will
scorn this island -- for truly I have but a hard, rocky soil --
and overturn me and ****** me down with his feet in the depths of
the sea; then will the great ocean wash deep above my head for
ever, and he will go to another land such as will please him,
there to make his temple and wooded groves.  So, many-footed
creatures of the sea will make their lairs in me and black seals
their dwellings undisturbed, because I lack people.  Yet if you
will but dare to sware a great oath, goddess, that here first he
will build a glorious temple to be an oracle for men, then let
him afterwards make temples and wooded groves amongst all men;
for surely he will be greatly renowned.

(ll. 83-88) So said Delos.  And Leto sware the great oath of the
gods: 'Now hear this, Earth and wide Heaven above, and dropping
water of Styx (this is the strongest and most awful oath for the
blessed gods), surely Phoebus shall have here his fragrant altar
and precinct, and you he shall honour above all.'

(ll. 89-101) Now when Leto had sworn and ended her oath, Delos
was very glad at the birth of the far-shooting lord.  But Leto
was racked nine days and nine nights with pangs beyond wont.  And
there were with her all the chiefest of the goddesses, Dione and
Rhea and Ichnaea and Themis and loud-moaning Amphitrite and the
other deathless goddesses save white-armed Hera, who sat in the
halls of cloud-gathering Zeus.  Only Eilithyia, goddess of sore
travail, had not heard of Leto's trouble, for she sat on the top
of Olympus beneath golden clouds by white-armed Hera's
contriving, who kept her close through envy, because Leto with
the lovely tresses was soon to bear a son faultless and strong.

(ll. 102-114) But the goddesses sent out Iris from the well-set
isle to bring Eilithyia, promising her a great necklace strung
with golden threads, nine cubits long.  And they bade Iris call
her aside from white-armed Hera, lest she might afterwards turn
her from coming with her words.  When swift Iris, fleet of foot
as the wind, had heard all this, she set to run; and quickly
finishing all the distance she came to the home of the gods,
sheer Olympus, and forthwith called Eilithyia out from the hall
to the door and spoke winged words to her, telling her all as the
goddesses who dwell on Olympus had bidden her.  So she moved the
heart of Eilithyia in her dear breast; and they went their way,
like shy wild-doves in their going.

(ll. 115-122) And as soon as Eilithyia the goddess of sore
travail set foot on Delos, the pains of birth seized Leto, and
she longed to bring forth; so she cast her arms about a palm tree
and kneeled on the soft meadow while the earth laughed for joy
beneath.  Then the child leaped forth to the light, and all the
goddesses washed you purely and cleanly with sweet water, and
swathed you in a white garment of fine texture, new-woven, and
fastened a golden band about you.

(ll. 123-130) Now Leto did not give Apollo, bearer of the golden
blade, her breast; but Themis duly poured nectar and ambrosia
with her divine hands: and Leto was glad because she had borne a
strong son and an archer.  But as soon as you had tasted that
divine heavenly food, O Phoebus, you could no longer then be held
by golden cords nor confined with bands, but all their ends were
undone.  Forthwith Phoebus Apollo spoke out among the deathless
goddesses:

(ll. 131-132) 'The lyre and the curved bow shall ever be dear to
me, and I will declare to men the unfailing will of Zeus.'

(ll. 133-139) So said Phoebus, the long-haired god who shoots
afar and began to walk upon the wide-pathed earth; and all
goddesses were amazed at him.  Then with gold all Delos was
laden, beholding the child of Zeus and Leto, for joy because the
god chose her above the islands and shore to make his dwelling in
her: and she loved him yet more in her heart, and blossomed as
does a mountain-top with woodland flowers.

(ll. 140-164) And you, O lord Apollo, god of the silver bow,
shooting afar, now walked on craggy Cynthus, and now kept
wandering about the island and the people in them.  Many are your
temples and wooded groves, and all peaks and towering bluffs of
lofty mountains and rivers flowing to the sea are dear to you,
Phoebus, yet in Delos do you most delight your heart; for there
the long robed Ionians gather in your honour with their children
and shy wives: mindful, they delight you with boxing and dancing
and song, so often as they hold their gathering.  A man would say
that they were deathless and unageing if he should then come upon
the Ionians so met together.  For he would see the graces of them
all, and would be pleased in heart gazing at the men and well-
girded women with their swift ships and great wealth.  And there
is this great wonder besides -- and its renown shall never perish
-- the girls of Delos, hand-maidens of the Far-shooter; for when
they have praised Apollo first, and also Leto and Artemis who
delights in arrows, they sing a strain-telling of men and women
of past days, and charm the tribes of men.  Also they can imitate
the tongues of all men and their clattering speech: each would
say that he himself were singing, so close to truth is their
sweet song.

(ll. 165-178) And now may Apollo be favourable and Artemis; and
farewell all you maidens.  Remember me in after time whenever any
one of men on earth, a stranger who has seen and suffered much,
comes here and asks of you: 'Whom think ye, girls, is the
sweetest singer that comes here, and in whom do you most
delight?'  Then answer, each and all, with one voice: 'He is a
blind man, and dwells in rocky Chios: his lays are evermore
supreme.'  As for me, I will carry your renown as far as I roam
over the earth to the well-placed this thing is true.  And I will
never cease to praise far-shooting Apollo, god of the silver bow,
whom rich-haired Leto bare.

TO PYTHIAN APOLLO --

(ll. 179-181) O Lord, Lycia is yours and lovely Maeonia and
Miletus, charming city by the sea, but over wave-girt Delos you
greatly reign your own self.

(ll. 182-206) Leto's all-glorious son goes to rocky Pytho,
playing upon his hollow lyre, clad in divine, perfumed garments;
and at the touch of the golden key his lyre sings sweet.  Thence,
swift as thought, he speeds from earth to Olympus, to the house
of Zeus, to join the gathering of the other gods: then
straightway the undying gods think only of the lyre and song, and
all the Muses together, voice sweetly answering voice, hymn the
unending gifts the gods enjoy and the sufferings of men, all that
they endure at the hands of the deathless gods, and how they live
witless and helpless and cannot find healing for death or defence
against old age.  Meanwhile the rich-tressed Graces and cheerful
Seasons dance with Harmonia and **** and Aphrodite, daughter of
Zeus, holding each other by the wrist.  And among them sings one,
not mean nor puny, but tall to look upon and enviable in mien,
Artemis who delights in arrows, sister of Apollo.  Among them
sport Ares and the keen-eyed Slayer of Argus, while Apollo plays
his lyre stepping high and featly and a radiance shines around
him, the gleaming of his feet and close-woven vest.  And they,
even gold-tressed Leto and wise Zeus, rejoice in their great
hearts as they watch their dear son playing among the undying
gods.

(ll. 207-228) How then shall I sing of you -- though in all ways
you are a worthy theme for song?  Shall I sing of you as wooer
and in the fields of love, how you went wooing the daughter of
Azan along with god-like Ischys the son of well-horsed Elatius,
or with Phorbas sprung from Triops, or with Ereutheus, or with
Leucippus and the wife of Leucippus....
((LACUNA))
....you on foot, he with his chariot, yet he fell not short of
Triops.  Or shall I sing how at the first you went about the
earth seeking a place of oracle for men, O far-shooting Apollo?
To Pieria first you went down from Olympus and passed by sandy
Lectus and Enienae and through the land of the Perrhaebi.  Soon
you came to Iolcus and set foot on Cenaeum in Euboea, famed for
ships: you stood in the Lelantine plain, but it pleased not your
heart to make a temple there and wooded groves.  From there you
crossed the Euripus, far-shooting Apollo, and went up the green,
holy hills, going on to Mycalessus and grassy-bedded Teumessus,
and so came to the wood-clad abode of Thebe; for as yet no man
lived in holy Thebe, nor were there tracks or ways about Thebe's
wheat-bearing plain as yet.

(ll. 229-238) And further still you went, O far-shooting Apollo,
and came to Onchestus, Poseidon's bright grove: there the new-
broken cold distressed with drawing the trim chariot gets spirit
again, and the skilled driver springs from his car and goes on
his way.  Then the horses for a while rattle the empty car, being
rid of guidance; and if they break the chariot in the woody
grove, men look after the horses, but tilt the chariot and leave
it there; for this was the rite from the very first.  And the
drivers pray to the lord of the shrine; but the chariot falls to
the lot of the god.

(ll. 239-243) Further yet you went, O far-shooting Apollo, and
reached next Cephissus' sweet stream which pours forth its sweet-
flowing water from Lilaea, and crossing over it, O worker from
afar, you passed many-towered Ocalea and reached grassy
Haliartus.

(ll. 244-253) Then you went towards Telphusa: and there the
pleasant place seemed fit for making a temple and wooded grove.
You came very near and spoke to her: 'Telphusa, here I am minded
to make a glorious temple, an oracle for men, and hither they
will always bring perfect hecatombs, both those who live in rich
Peloponnesus and those of Europe and all the wave-washed isles,
coming to seek oracles.  And I will deliver to them all counsel
that cannot fail, giving answer in my rich temple.'

(ll. 254-276) So said Phoebus Apollo, and laid out all the
foundations throughout, wide and very long.  But when Telphusa
saw this, she was angry in heart and spoke, saying: 'Lord
Phoebus, worker from afar, I will speak a word of counsel to your
heart, since you are minded to make here a glorious temple to be
an oracle for men who will always bring hither perfect hecatombs
for you; yet I will speak out, and do you lay up my words in your
heart.  The trampling of swift horses and the sound of mules
watering at my sacred springs will always irk you, and men will
like better to gaze at the well-made chariots and stamping,
swift-footed horses than at your great temple and the many
treasures that are within.  But if you will be moved by me -- for
you, lord, are stronger and mightier than I, and your strength is
very great -- build at Crisa below the glades of Parnassus: there
no bright chariot will clash, and there will be no noise of
swift-footed horses near your well-built altar.  But so the
glorious tribes of men will bring gifts to you as Iepaeon ('Hail-
Healer'), and you will receive with delight rich sacrifices from
the people dwelling round about.'  So said Telphusa, that she
alone, and not the Far-Shooter, should have renown there; and she
persuaded the Far-Shooter.

(ll. 277-286) Further yet you went, far-shooting Apollo, until
you came to the town of the presumptuous Phlegyae who dwell on
this earth in a lovely glade near the Cephisian lake, caring not
for Zeus.  And thence you went speeding swiftly to the mountain
ridge, and came to Crisa beneath snowy Parnassus, a foothill
turned towards the west: a cliff hangs over if from above, and a
hollow, rugged glade runs under.  There the lord Phoebus Apollo
resolved to make his lovely temple, and thus he said:

(ll. 287-293) 'In this place I am minded to build a glorious
temple to be an oracle for men, and here they will always bring
perfect hecatombs, both they who dwell in rich Peloponnesus and
the men of Europe and from all the wave-washed isles, coming to
question me.  And I will deliver to them all counsel that cannot
fail, answering them in my rich temple.'

(ll. 294-299) When h

Ashwin Kumar May 2023

You Are Not A Woman

To quote Athos from "The Three Musketeers"
"You are not a woman
You are a demon escaped from Hell"
When I first met you as a colleague
I made the mistake
Of getting friendly with you
When I should have ensured
That our relationship was going to be strictly professional
Of course, you had your own ways
Of charming those whom you came in contact with
That is something for which I have to give you credit
Albeit grudgingly
And you were an expert
At playing the victim card
Nevertheless, after I changed jobs
I thought I had seen the last of you
However, you came back into my life
As unexpectedly as the recent rains in Chennai
Initially, it seemed kind of sweet
However, I should have realised sooner
That you had certain ulterior motives
Unfortunately, I got fooled by your sweet talk
And started helping you financially
Because you looked up to me as a brother
I never doubted you in the slightest
Which was probably the biggest mistake of my life
You took advantage of me
In the worst way possible
And kept draining my bank account
Your lies kept getting taller and taller
And I kept believing them
Because, you had me well and truly under your thumb
However, even the most credulous person in the world
Can develop suspicions at some stage
Thus, after years of being in a psychological coma
I finally managed to wake up to the harsh reality
And told my family everything
Of course, with the help of a dear family friend
After we finally confronted you
You signed a written agreement
Promising to return all my money
Within a certain deadline
That deadline has long since passed
And you have not paid even ten percent of your dues
What is worse
Is the fact that you are absconding
And giving absolutely nonsensical reasons
Which even an utter fool would find it difficult to believe
You ruined my life
Destroyed my happiness
And shattered my self-confidence
Is this the way you treat a person
Whom you have addressed as "brother"
Not once, not twice, but several times?
I am giving you one last chance
Not for your sake
But for the sake of humanity
You had better take it
Because, if not
Then you will soon find yourself in prison
Again, to quote Athos
"You are not a woman
You are a demon escaped from Hell"

Another poem dedicated to a Gujarati girl who used to be my ex-colleague and has cheated me out of my entire savings under the garb of a sister

#cheats #fakefriends #falsefriends #betrayals #frauds #friendship

Aeschylus

The Beacon Fires

A GLEAM -- a gleam -- from Ida's height,
By the Fire-god sent, it came;
From watch to watch it leapt, that light,
As a rider rode the flame!
It shot through the startled sky,
And the torch of that blazing glory
Old Lemnos caught on high,
On its holy promontory,
And sent it on, the jocund sign,
To Athos, Mount of Jove divine.
Wildly the while, it rose from the isle,
So that the might of the journeying Light
Skimmed over the back of the gleaming brine!
Farther and faster speeds it on,
Till the watch that keeps Macistus steep
See it burst like a blazing Sun!
Doth Macistus sleep
On his tower-clad steep?
No! rapid and red doth the wild fire sweep;
It flashes afar on the wayward stream
Of the wild Euripus, the rushing beam!
It rouses the light on Messapion's height,
And they feed its breath with the withered heath.
But it may not stay!
And away -- away --
It bounds in its freshening might.

Silent and soon,
Like a broadened moon,
It passes in sheen, Asopus green,
And bursts on Cithaeron gray!
The warder wakes to the Signal-rays,
And it swoops from the hill with a broader blaze.
On, on the fiery Glory rode;
Thy lonely lake, Gorgopis, glowed!
To Megara's Mount it came;
They feed it again
And it streams amain--
A giant beard of Flame!
The headland cliffs that darkly down
O'er the Saronic waters frown,
Are passed with the Swift One's lurid stride,
And the huge rock glares on the glaring tide.
With mightier march and fiercer power
It gained Arachne's neighboring tower;
Thence on our Argive roof its rest it won,
Of Ida's fire the long-descended Son!
Bright Harbinger of glory and of joy!
So first and last with equal honor crowned,
In solemn feasts the race-torch circles round. --
And these my heralds! -- this my SIGN OF PEACE;
Lo! while we breathe, the victor lords of Greece
Stalk, in stern tumult, through the halls of Troy!

Homer

The Iliad: Book 14

Nestor was sitting over his wine, but the cry of battle did not
escape him, and he said to the son of Aesculapius, “What, noble
Machaon, is the meaning of all this? The shouts of men fighting by our
ships grow stronger and stronger; stay here, therefore, and sit over
your wine, while fair Hecamede heats you a bath and washes the clotted
blood from off you. I will go at once to the look-out station and
see what it is all about.”
  As he spoke he took up the shield of his son Thrasymedes that was
lying in his tent, all gleaming with bronze, for Thrasymedes had taken
his father’s shield; he grasped his redoubtable bronze-shod spear, and
as soon as he was outside saw the disastrous rout of the Achaeans who,
now that their wall was overthrown, were flying pell-mell before the
Trojans. As when there is a heavy swell upon the sea, but the waves
are dumb—they keep their eyes on the watch for the quarter whence the
fierce winds may spring upon them, but they stay where they are and
set neither this way nor that, till some particular wind sweeps down
from heaven to determine them—even so did the old man ponder
whether to make for the crowd of Danaans, or go in search of
Agamemnon. In the end he deemed it best to go to the son of Atreus;
but meanwhile the hosts were fighting and killing one another, and the
hard bronze rattled on their bodies, as they ****** at one another
with their swords and spears.
  The wounded kings, the son of Tydeus, Ulysses, and Agamemnon son
of Atreus, fell in Nestor as they were coming up from their ships—for
theirs were drawn up some way from where the fighting was going on,
being on the shore itself inasmuch as they had been beached first,
while the wall had been built behind the hindermost. The stretch of
the shore, wide though it was, did not afford room for all the
ships, and the host was cramped for space, therefore they had placed
the ships in rows one behind the other, and had filled the whole
opening of the bay between the two points that formed it. The kings,
leaning on their spears, were coming out to survey the fight, being in
great anxiety, and when old Nestor met them they were filled with
dismay. Then King Agamemnon said to him, “Nestor son of Neleus, honour
to the Achaean name, why have you left the battle to come hither? I
fear that what dread Hector said will come true, when he vaunted among
the Trojans saying that he would not return to Ilius till he had fired
our ships and killed us; this is what he said, and now it is all
coming true. Alas! others of the Achaeans, like Achilles, are in anger
with me that they refuse to fight by the sterns of our ships.”
  Then Nestor knight of Gerene answered, “It is indeed as you say;
it is all coming true at this moment, and even Jove who thunders
from on high cannot prevent it. Fallen is the wall on which we
relied as an impregnable bulwark both for us and our fleet. The
Trojans are fighting stubbornly and without ceasing at the ships; look
where you may you cannot see from what quarter the rout of the
Achaeans is coming; they are being killed in a confused mass and the
battle-cry ascends to heaven; let us think, if counsel can be of any
use, what we had better do; but I do not advise our going into
battle ourselves, for a man cannot fight when he is wounded.”
  And King Agamemnon answered, “Nestor, if the Trojans are indeed
fighting at the rear of our ships, and neither the wall nor the trench
has served us—over which the Danaans toiled so hard, and which they
deemed would be an impregnable bulwark both for us and our fleet—I
see it must be the will of Jove that the Achaeans should perish
ingloriously here, far from Argos. I knew when Jove was willing to
defend us, and I know now that he is raising the Trojans to like
honour with the gods, while us, on the other hand, he bas bound hand
and foot. Now, therefore, let us all do as I say; let us bring down
the ships that are on the beach and draw them into the water; let us
make them fast to their mooring-stones a little way out, against the
fall of night—if even by night the Trojans will desist from fighting;
we may then draw down the rest of the fleet. There is nothing wrong in
flying ruin even by night. It is better for a man that he should fly
and be saved than be caught and killed.”
  Ulysses looked fiercely at him and said, “Son of Atreus, what are
you talking about? Wretch, you should have commanded some other and
baser army, and not been ruler over us to whom Jove has allotted a
life of hard fighting from youth to old age, till we every one of us
perish. Is it thus that you would quit the city of Troy, to win
which we have suffered so much hardship? Hold your peace, lest some
other of the Achaeans hear you say what no man who knows how to give
good counsel, no king over so great a host as that of the Argives
should ever have let fall from his lips. I despise your judgement
utterly for what you have been saying. Would you, then, have us draw
down our ships into the water while the battle is raging, and thus
play further into the hands of the conquering Trojans? It would be
ruin; the Achaeans will not go on fighting when they see the ships
being drawn into the water, but will cease attacking and keep
turning their eyes towards them; your counsel, therefore, Sir captain,
would be our destruction.”
  Agamemnon answered, “Ulysses, your rebuke has stung me to the heart.
I am not, however, ordering the Achaeans to draw their ships into
the sea whether they will or no. Some one, it may be, old or young,
can offer us better counsel which I shall rejoice to hear.”
  Then said Diomed, “Such an one is at hand; he is not far to seek, if
you will listen to me and not resent my speaking though I am younger
than any of you. I am by lineage son to a noble sire, Tydeus, who lies
buried at Thebes. For Portheus had three noble sons, two of whom,
Agrius and Melas, abode in Pleuron and rocky Calydon. The third was
the knight Oeneus, my father’s father, and he was the most valiant
of them all. Oeeneus remained in his own country, but my father (as
Jove and the other gods ordained it) migrated to Argos. He married
into the family of Adrastus, and his house was one of great abundance,
for he had large estates of rich corn-growing land, with much
orchard ground as well, and he had many sheep; moreover he excelled
all the Argives in the use of the spear. You must yourselves have
heard whether these things are true or no; therefore when I say well
despise not my words as though I were a coward or of ignoble birth.
I say, then, let us go to the fight as we needs must, wounded though
we be. When there, we may keep out of the battle and beyond the
range of the spears lest we get fresh wounds in addition to what we
have already, but we can spur on others, who have been indulging their
spleen and holding aloof from battle hitherto.”
  Thus did he speak; whereon they did even as he had said and set out,
King Agamemnon leading the way.
  Meanwhile Neptune had kept no blind look-out, and came up to them in
the semblance of an old man. He took Agamemnon’s right hand in his own
and said, “Son of Atreus, I take it Achilles is glad now that he
sees the Achaeans routed and slain, for he is utterly without remorse-
may he come to a bad end and heaven confound him. As for yourself, the
blessed gods are not yet so bitterly angry with you but that the
princes and counsellors of the Trojans shall again raise the dust upon
the plain, and you shall see them flying from the ships and tents
towards their city.”
  With this he raised a mighty cry of battle, and sped forward to
the plain. The voice that came from his deep chest was as that of nine
or ten thousand men when they are shouting in the thick of a fight,
and it put fresh courage into the hearts of the Achaeans to wage war
and do battle without ceasing.
  Juno of the golden throne looked down as she stood upon a peak of
Olympus and her heart was gladdened at the sight of him who was at
once her brother and her brother-in-law, hurrying hither and thither
amid the fighting. Then she turned her eyes to Jove as he sat on the
topmost crests of many-fountained Ida, and loathed him. She set
herself to think how she might hoodwink him, and in the end she deemed
that it would be best for her to go to Ida and array herself in rich
attire, in the hope that Jove might become enamoured of her, and
wish to embrace her. While he was thus engaged a sweet and careless
sleep might be made to steal over his eyes and senses.
  She went, therefore, to the room which her son Vulcan had made
her, and the doors of which he had cunningly fastened by means of a
secret key so that no other god could open them. Here she entered
and closed the doors behind her. She cleansed all the dirt from her
fair body with ambrosia, then she anointed herself with olive oil,
ambrosial, very soft, and scented specially for herself—if it were so
much as shaken in the bronze-floored house of Jove, the scent pervaded
the universe of heaven and earth. With this she anointed her
delicate skin, and then she plaited the fair ambrosial locks that
flowed in a stream of golden tresses from her immortal head. She put
on the wondrous robe which Minerva had worked for her with
consummate art, and had embroidered with manifold devices; she
fastened it about her ***** with golden clasps, and she girded herself
with a girdle that had a hundred tassels: then she fastened her
earrings, three brilliant pendants that glistened most beautifully,
through the pierced lobes of her ears, and threw a lovely new veil
over her head. She bound her sandals on to her feet, and when she
had arrayed herself perfectly to her satisfaction, she left her room
and called Venus to come aside and speak to her. “My dear child,” said
she, “will you do what I am going to ask of you, or will refuse me
because you are angry at my being on the Danaan side, while you are on
the Trojan?”
  Jove’s daughter Venus answered, “Juno, august queen of goddesses,
daughter of mighty Saturn, say what you want, and I will do it for
at once, if I can, and if it can be done at all.”
  Then Juno told her a lying tale and said, “I want you to endow me
with some of those fascinating charms, the spells of which bring all
things mortal and immortal to your feet. I am going to the world’s end
to visit Oceanus (from whom all we gods proceed) and mother Tethys:
they received me in their house, took care of me, and brought me up,
having taken me over from Rhaea when Jove imprisoned great Saturn in
the depths that are under earth and sea. I must go and see them that I
may make peace between them; they have been quarrelling, and are so
angry that they have not slept with one another this long while; if
I can bring them round and restore them to one another’s embraces,
they will be grateful to me and love me for ever afterwards.”
  Thereon laughter-loving Venus said, “I cannot and must not refuse
you, for you sleep in the arms of Jove who is our king.”
  As she spoke she loosed from her ***** the curiously embroidered
girdle into which all her charms had been wrought—love, desire, and
that sweet flattery which steals the judgement even of the most
prudent. She gave the girdle to Juno and said, “Take this girdle
wherein all my charms reside and lay it in your *****. If you will
wear it I promise you that your errand, be it what it may, will not be
bootless.”
  When she heard this Juno smiled, and still smiling she laid the
girdle in her *****.
  Venus now went back into the house of Jove, while Juno darted down
from the summits of Olympus. She passed over Pieria and fair
Emathia, and went on and on till she came to the snowy ranges of the
Thracian horsemen, over whose topmost crests she sped without ever
setting foot to ground. When she came to Athos she went on over the,
waves of the sea till she reached Lemnos, the city of noble Thoas.
There she met Sleep, own brother to Death, and caught him by the hand,
saying, “Sleep, you who lord it alike over mortals and immortals, if
you ever did me a service in times past, do one for me now, and I
shall be grateful to you ever after. Close Jove’s keen eyes for me
in slumber while I hold him clasped in my embrace, and I will give you
a beautiful golden seat, that can never fall to pieces; my
clubfooted son Vulcan shall make it for you, and he shall give it a
footstool for you to rest your fair feet upon when you are at table.”
  Then Sleep answered, “Juno, great queen of goddesses, daughter of
mighty Saturn, I would lull any other of the gods to sleep without
compunction, not even excepting the waters of Oceanus from whom all of
them proceed, but I dare not go near Jove, nor send him to sleep
unless he bids me. I have had one lesson already through doing what
you asked me, on the day when Jove’s mighty son Hercules set sail from
Ilius after having sacked the city of the Trojans. At your bidding I
suffused my sweet self over the mind of aegis-bearing Jove, and laid
him to rest; meanwhile you hatched a plot against Hercules, and set
the blasts of the angry winds beating upon the sea, till you took
him to the goodly city of Cos away from all his friends. Jove was
furious when he awoke, and began hurling the gods about all over the
house; he was looking more particularly for myself, and would have
flung me down through space into the sea where I should never have
been heard of any more, had not Night who cows both men and gods
protected me. I fled to her and Jove left off looking for me in
spite of his being so angry, for he did not dare do anything to
displease Night. And now you are again asking me to do something on
which I cannot venture.”
  And Juno said, “Sleep, why do you take such notions as those into
your head? Do you think Jove will be as anxious to help the Trojans,
as he was about his own son? Come, I will marry you to one of the
youngest of the Graces, and she shall be your own—Pasithea, whom
you have always wanted to marry.”
  Sleep was pleased when he heard this, and answered, “Then swear it
to me by the dread waters of the river Styx; lay one hand on the
bounteous earth, and the other on the sheen of the sea, so that all
the gods who dwell down below with Saturn may be our witnesses, and
see that you really do give me one of the youngest of the Graces-
Pasithea, whom I have always wanted to marry.”
  Juno did as he had said. She swore, and invoked all the gods of
the nether world, who are called Titans, to witness. When she had
completed her oath, the two enshrouded themselves in a thick mist
and sped lightly forward, leaving Lemnos and Imbrus behind them.
Presently they reached many-fountained Ida, mother of wild beasts, and
Lectum where they left the sea to go on by land, and the tops of the
trees of the forest soughed under the going of their feet. Here
Sleep halted, and ere Jove caught sight of him he climbed a lofty
pine-tree—the tallest that reared its head towards heaven on all Ida.
He hid himself behind the branches and sat there in the semblance of
the sweet-singing bird that haunts the mountains and is called Chalcis
by the gods, but men call it Cymindis. Juno then went to Gargarus, the
topmost peak of Ida, and Jove, driver of the clouds, set eyes upon
her. As soon as he did so he became inflamed with the same
passionate desire for her that he had felt when they had first enjoyed
each other’s embraces, and slept with one another without their dear
parents knowing anything about it. He went up to her and said, “What
do you want that you have come hither from Olympus—and that too
with neither chariot nor horses to convey you?”
  Then Juno told him a lying tale and said, “I am going to the world’s
end, to visit Oceanus, from whom all we gods proceed, and mother
Tethys; they received me into their house, took care of me, and
brought me up. I must go and see them that I may make peace between
them: they have been quarrelling, and are so angry that they have
not slept with one another this long time. The horses that will take
me over land and sea are stationed on the lowermost spurs of
many-fountained Ida, and I have come here from Olympus on purpose to
consult you

MonTueWed May 2013

Geeky Greeky

from Ida's height,

By the Fire-god sent, it came;

From watch to watch it leapt, that light,

As a rider rode the flame!

It shot through the startled sky,

And the torch of that blazing glory

Old Lemnos caught on high,

On its holy promontory,

And sent it on, the jocund sign,

To Athos, Mount of Jove divine.

Wildly the while, it rose from the isle,

So that the might of the journeying Light

Skimmed over the back of the gleaming brine!

Farther and faster speeds it on,

Till the watch that keeps Macistus steep

See it burst like a blazing Sun!

Doth Macistus sleep

On his tower-clad steep?

No! rapid and red doth the wild fire sweep;
It flashes afar on the wayward stream

Of the wild Euripus, the rushing beam!

It rouses the light on Messapion's height,

And they feed its breath with the withered heath.

But it may not stay!

And away -- away --

It bounds in its freshening might.

ghost queen Apr 2020

Séraphine, Chapitre nº 5, Tango à Paris (vampire erotica)

It was getting dark when I exited the Port d’Orleans metro station. The cold air hit me instantaneously, seeping in between my clothes and skin. I tighten my long coat around me, readjusted my back pack, and pulled out my phone to confirm the address of Tango à Paris. It was only two blocks north of where I was standing.

It was my first date with Séraphine. I had suggested dinner. She suggested something less formal, a bit more active, how about tango, explaining her studio gave a hour long introduction before the milonga. I agreed, as I had taken a year of tango, and felt confident I could keep up, maybe even impress her.

I’d wondered how she kept her 5 foot 8, 130 pound-ish physique, swimmer lean, and now I knew, she was a dancer.

I liked this part of Paris, the 14th arrondissement, L’Observatoire, clean, tidy, having the look and feel of a Nordic city like Olso or Stockholm. The sidewalks were full of interweaving professionals, eager to get out of the cold, the drizzle, and home to their loved ones.

I walked up L’Avenue du Général Leclerc till I got to No 119. I pressed the buzzer and heard back, “oui.” “I am here for the milonga,” I said. The door buzzed, I pushed it open, entering a small foyer with sign pointing up a staircase to the first floor. I could hear the muffed sound of music and feel the movement of bodies dancing upstairs.

I climbed the curved wrought iron staircase, the old wooden stairs creaking softly with every step. I saw the studio immediately: two traditional French doors swung open, exposing a gymnasium like dance studio, with clean, golden yellow oak hardwood floor. Men and woman dancing, swinging and spinning about.

I entered the studio, paused, and looked around. At the far of the room was the DJ, sitting at table, with two loud speakers on stands pumping out music at just the right volume: loud enough to feel the music, low enough to talk your partner without having to scream in her ear.

To my left, people gathered around a table. I walked over, they were writing their names with a felt tip pens on self adhesive name tags and placing it on their chest. A woman turned around and smiled at me. “Bienvenue,” she said, “I’m Jolene.” and extended her hand. “I am Damien”, I replied, shaking her hand politely. “Is this your first time here,” she asked. “Yes,” I replied, “I am waiting on a friend, Seraphine.”

“Mais oui,” she replied with a smile, “she is one of our best dancers, talented, if not gifted.” Her head turned slowly towards the doors, my eyes following.

In the door stood Seraphine, wearing a spaghetti strap, damask black on maroon tango midi dress, slit high up her right tigh. Her shoes, opened toe, black thin strap heels, showing off her matching blood red toe and finger nail polish and lipstick. Her eyelashes thick, black, eyelids smoked dark, giving her the stereotypical look of a femme fatale tango dancer.  She was gorgeous, seductive, awe inspiring, like Bouguereau's The Birth of Venus. How could a man resist such a siren. She was goddess among women.

She walked over to us, said, “Bonsoir Madame,” and kissed Jolene
twice on the cheeks (faire la bise) as is customary among Parisian friends, then  turned to me, touched her cheek to mine, making the mwah, kissing sound.

I was intrigued. The kiss implied no longer an acquaintance, but in her inner circle of intimacy. It had subtle implications that set my mind racing about the meaning; it was also maddening, like trying to see a completed jigsaw puzzle while only holding one of a thousand pieces.

“Ca va,” she asked, bypassing the formal “comment vas-tu” greeting. “Ca va bien,” I replied. “Your dress is stunning,” I said. “Thank you,” she replied, with confidence.

She sat down, ruffled through her bag, and pulled out ecru opened toe tango shoes. I couldn’t help notice her feet, delicate, feminine, absolutely exquisite. I also couldn’t help noticing her tigh, exposed through the slit of her dress.

Before she could get up from the chair, an older man approached, extended his hand, which she accepted. She stood up, looked me in the eyes, and said, “it is rude to refused a dance when asked.” They walked to middle of the floor and started to dance to a slow, sultry, Spanish guitar piece. I sat down and watched. She didn’t just dance, she pranced, shook, and swayed her hips as only an accomplished Latin dancer could. It was amazing to watch.

The music repeated, slowed, and concluded. They walked off the dance floor, to the beverage table, topped with a variety of multicolored bottles of wine. He poured two glasses, offered her one, as they talked, she smiled and occasionally laughed. He bowed his head slightly, touched her upper arm, and walked away, as a cortina started.

Seraphine poured more wine in her glass and poured another glass, walked to me, and offered it. I took it, deliberately touching her hand as I did. She sat down, crossed her legs, the dress sliding aside, exposing her tigh, and asked me, “do you dance monsieur.” “Yes, mademoiselle,” I replied, as a new tanda of spanish guitar played. She stood up, extended her hand. I took it, stood up, and lead her to the middle of the floor, dodging couples along the way.

“Tango”, I asked. “Yes,” she replied. I move in close, wrapped my right arm across her back, pressing her body tight against mine, extending my left arm out in position, palm open. She carefully placed her hand in mine, her forefinger on my thumb, her thumb on the radial artery on wrist, as if feeling my pulse. It struck me as odd and was curious as to why.  She’d done it in a such a methodical way.

Her hands were warm, soft, supple, dewy. She closed her grip and waited for me. I swayed gently to the beat of Tango D’Amor by Bellma Cesepedes, as she rhythmically matched my body. I stepped back on my right foot, holding her tight, bringing her with me, then left,  then forward. My chest pressing into hers. My leg brushed against her tigh as I moved, slow, slow, quick, quick, slow of the basic 8 count. I paused for a second, for her to cross then pushed forward, slowly turning to avoid couples.

I sensed her body heat, felt the wetness of perspiration on her back, smelled the earthiness of her scent. She radiated animal magnetism. I couldn’t, nor wanted to resist her. I knew I was a moth, she the flame.

New music started to play, Fuego Tango by Athos Bassissi, a traditional fast staccato accordion piece with a distinct beat for walking, turning, and swaying. I placed my my hand between her shoulders. I couldn’t feel a strap. She wasn’t wearing bra. It felt intimate, seductive, only a thin layer of cloth between us.

She pulled her head back, looked at me in the eyes, and said, “Tighter, I need to feel you, your body, your moves, so I can respond to your body.” I wrapped by arm completely around her, pulling her tight against my me. My primal urges welled up. I wanted her, to kiss her, to protect her,  to provide for her, have and raise kids with her. I felt stronger, more powerful, like a man. I wanted her in my life before she disappeared forever.

She placed her forehead on my temple. I rocked back and forth catching the beat, stepping backwards with my right, and we started to dance, slow, slow, quick, quick, slow, in a vertical expression of horizon desire.

Bending my knee, sliding forward, my chest pressing against hers, pushing, stopping, shifting, subtly twisting, I signaled a backward ocho. I waited for her, than slide to the left bring her with me, waited for her to pivot then slid right, bringing her with me, then waited for her to center. I walked forward, stopped, signalling for her to cross. I waited for the beat then finished my eight step basic.

I could feel her breath on my cheek, fast, hot; felt her breathing, her chest rising, falling sensuously. She felt good in my arms, as right as rain. I liked holding her, feeling her so close to me.

I started an eight step, stopping at the cross, signaling her to move right in preparation for a scada. As she moved, I stepped between her legs, pivoting her and me 180 degrees, repeating the step 3 times, bringing her back to cross, and finishing the step.

I heard her audibly exhale, relaxing in my arms. She was giving up control, learning to trust, surrendering to me. And I, was one with her, nothing else mattered, all else had disappeared. I was in a state of deep mediation. She was the now and forever.

The music stopped, I looked at her, noticed the glow in her cheeks, felt the warm moistness on her back. But most of all, I noticed her dilated pupils. The glowing sapphire blue of her eyes, replaced by a fathomless blackness, which I fell into.

She looked into my eyes with a gentleness, a knowing, and smiled. A new piece started, Rain, by Kantango, clean, crisp, staccato. I moved, walked, slid, in step with the beat, losing myself in the sensuality of the music and the movement of the dance.  I pressed her tight against my chest, sliding forward, rock stepping backward, holding her tighter as I did a single axis spin. I heard her sigh in my ear and felt her body relax. I slid forward to the staccato rhythm, dramatic, forceful, almost charging.

I stopped and lean to my left. She extended her right leg back, and planeo-ed as I walked her in a circle, side-by-side rock, then to neutral. She tighten her hold, pressing me into her chest, her touch telling me so much, screaming her arousal.

I slid forward, to the side, staring an 8 count to the cross, going into a backward ocho, I shifted my weight, taking her into a moulinette, twisting to the right then to the left, as she elegantly danced around me, back to 5 to complete our 8 count.

I was no longer thinking, just feeling, one with the music, lost in the sensuality, in a type of bliss. I walked forward then back, turning her to the right. To my surprise, she extended her left leg, whipping it across the floor, then back, wrapping it around my leg, slowly sliding her calf up my leg, then unwinding to neutral. I walked forward, she spun around, and slowed her walk. My body colliding, pressing into her’s as we slowly stopped. She turned her face towards mine, raising her hand, touching my face, my cheek, gently turning, bringing it towards her’s, towards her lips. Just as we were going to kiss, she turned her face, my face plunged into her hair, the back of her neck. I could smell, Poison by Dior. I kissed the back of her neck, squeezing her slightly, as she moaned ever so slightly.

Continued at:https://hellopoetry.com/poem/3930336/seraphine-chapitre-no-6-notre-damevampire-erotica/

#vampire #erotica #paris #france

William Ernest Henley

Envoy--To Charles Baxter

Do you remember
That afternoon--that Sunday afternoon!--
When, as the kirks were ringing in,
And the grey city teemed
With Sabbath feelings and aspects,
Lewis--our Lewis then,
Now the whole world's--and you,
Young, yet in shape most like an elder, came,
Laden with Balzacs
(Big, yellow books, quite impudently French),
The first of many times
To that transformed back-kitchen where I lay
So long, so many centuries--
Or years is it!--ago?

Dear Charles, since then
We have been friends, Lewis and you and I,
(How good it sounds, 'Lewis and you and I!'):
Such friends, I like to think,
That in us three, Lewis and me and you,
Is something of that gallant dream
Which old Dumas--the generous, the humane,
The seven-and-seventy times to be forgiven!--
Dreamed for a blessing to the race,
The immortal Musketeers.

Our Athos rests--the wise, the kind,
The liberal and august, his fault atoned,
Rests in the crowded yard
There at the west of Princes Street. We three--
You, I, and Lewis!--still afoot,
Are still together, and our lives,
In chime so long, may keep
(God bless the thought!)
Unjangled till the end.

SøułSurvivør Nov 2014

hello poetry [acrostic]

humans
expressing
love
laughter
opinions

pathos
onriness
excitement
tragedy
rhyme

Y**OURSELVES!

Good morning/afternoon/evening
all you poets out there!
Repost if you want to spread the love

#love #poetry #acrostic #hellopoetry #expression

Victor Hugo

Réponse à un acte d'accusation

Donc, c'est moi qui suis l'ogre et le bouc émissaire.
Dans ce chaos du siècle où votre coeur se serre,
J'ai foulé le bon goût et l'ancien vers françois
Sous mes pieds, et, hideux, j'ai dit à l'ombre : « Sois ! »
Et l'ombre fut. -- Voilà votre réquisitoire.
Langue, tragédie, art, dogmes, conservatoire,
Toute cette clarté s'est éteinte, et je suis
Le responsable, et j'ai vidé l'urne des nuits.
De la chute de tout je suis la pioche inepte ;
C'est votre point de vue. Eh bien, soit, je l'accepte ;
C'est moi que votre prose en colère a choisi ;
Vous me criez : « Racca » ; moi je vous dis : « Merci ! »
Cette marche du temps, qui ne sort d'une église
Que pour entrer dans l'autre, et qui se civilise ;
Ces grandes questions d'art et de liberté,
Voyons-les, j'y consens, par le moindre côté,
Et par le petit bout de la lorgnette. En somme,
J'en conviens, oui, je suis cet abominable homme ;
Et, quoique, en vérité, je pense avoir commis,
D'autres crimes encor que vous avez omis.
Avoir un peu touché les questions obscures,
Avoir sondé les maux, avoir cherché les cures,
De la vieille ânerie insulté les vieux bâts,
Secoué le passé du haut jusques en bas,
Et saccagé le fond tout autant que la forme.
Je me borne à ceci : je suis ce monstre énorme,
Je suis le démagogue horrible et débordé,
Et le dévastateur du vieil A B C D ;
Causons.

Quand je sortis du collège, du thème,
Des vers latins, farouche, espèce d'enfant blême
Et grave, au front penchant, aux membres appauvris ;
Quand, tâchant de comprendre et de juger, j'ouvris
Les yeux sur la nature et sur l'art, l'idiome,
Peuple et noblesse, était l'image du royaume ;
La poésie était la monarchie ; un mot
Était un duc et pair, ou n'était qu'un grimaud ;
Les syllabes, pas plus que Paris et que Londres,
Ne se mêlaient ; ainsi marchent sans se confondre
Piétons et cavaliers traversant le pont Neuf ;
La langue était l'état avant quatre-vingt-neuf ;
Les mots, bien ou mal nés, vivaient parqués en castes :
Les uns, nobles, hantant les Phèdres, les Jocastes,
Les Méropes, ayant le décorum pour loi,
Et montant à Versailles aux carrosses du roi ;
Les autres, tas de gueux, drôles patibulaires,
Habitant les patois ; quelques-uns aux galères
Dans l'argot ; dévoués à tous les genres bas,
Déchirés en haillons dans les halles ; sans bas,
Sans perruque ; créés pour la prose et la farce ;
Populace du style au fond de l'ombre éparse ;
Vilains, rustres, croquants, que Vaugelas leur chef
Dans le bagne Lexique avait marqué d'une F ;
N'exprimant que la vie abjecte et familière,
Vils, dégradés, flétris, bourgeois, bons pour Molière.
Racine regardait ces marauds de travers ;
Si Corneille en trouvait un blotti dans son vers,
Il le gardait, trop grand pour dire : « Qu'il s'en aille ;  »
Et Voltaire criait :  « Corneille s'encanaille ! »
Le bonhomme Corneille, humble, se tenait coi.
Alors, brigand, je vins ; je m'écriai :  « Pourquoi
Ceux-ci toujours devant, ceux-là toujours derrière ? »
Et sur l'Académie, aïeule et douairière,
Cachant sous ses jupons les tropes effarés,
Et sur les bataillons d'alexandrins carrés,

Je fis souffler un vent révolutionnaire.
Je mis un bonnet rouge au vieux dictionnaire.
Plus de mot sénateur ! plus de mot roturier !
Je fis une tempête au fond de l'encrier,
Et je mêlai, parmi les ombres débordées,
Au peuple noir des mots l'essaim blanc des idées ;
Et je dis :  « Pas de mot où l'idée au vol pur
Ne puisse se poser, tout humide d'azur ! »
Discours affreux ! -- Syllepse, hypallage, litote,
Frémirent ; je montai sur la borne Aristote,
Et déclarai les mots égaux, libres, majeurs.
Tous les envahisseurs et tous les ravageurs,
Tous ces tigres, les Huns les Scythes et les Daces,
N'étaient que des toutous auprès de mes audaces ;
Je bondis hors du cercle et brisai le compas.
Je nommai le cochon par son nom ; pourquoi pas ?
Guichardin a nommé le Borgia ! Tacite
Le Vitellius ! Fauve, implacable, explicite,
J'ôtai du cou du chien stupéfait son collier
D'épithètes ; dans l'herbe, à l'ombre du hallier,
Je fis fraterniser la vache et la génisse,
L'une étant Margoton et l'autre Bérénice.
Alors, l'ode, embrassant Rabelais, s'enivra ;
Sur le sommet du Pinde on dansait Ça ira ;
Les neuf muses, seins nus, chantaient la Carmagnole ;
L'emphase frissonna dans sa fraise espagnole ;
Jean, l'ânier, épousa la bergère Myrtil.
On entendit un roi dire : « Quelle heure est-il ? »
Je massacrais l'albâtre, et la neige, et l'ivoire,
Je retirai le jais de la prunelle noire,
Et j'osai dire au bras : « Sois blanc, tout simplement. »
Je violai du vers le cadavre fumant ;
J'y fis entrer le chiffre ; ô terreur! Mithridate
Du siège de Cyzique eût pu citer la date.
Jours d'effroi ! les Laïs devinrent des catins.
Force mots, par Restaut peignés tous les matins,

Et de Louis-Quatorze ayant gardé l'allure,
Portaient encor perruque ; à cette chevelure
La Révolution, du haut de son beffroi,
Cria : « Transforme-toi ! c'est l'heure. Remplis-toi
- De l'âme de ces mots que tu tiens prisonnière ! »
Et la perruque alors rugit, et fut crinière.
Liberté ! c'est ainsi qu'en nos rébellions,
Avec des épagneuls nous fîmes des lions,
Et que, sous l'ouragan maudit que nous soufflâmes,
Toutes sortes de mots se couvrirent de flammes.
J'affichai sur Lhomond des proclamations.
On y lisait : « Il faut que nous en finissions !
- Au panier les Bouhours, les Batteux, les Brossettes
- A la pensée humaine ils ont mis les poucettes.
- Aux armes, prose et vers ! formez vos bataillons !
- Voyez où l'on en est : la strophe a des bâillons !
- L'ode a des fers aux pieds, le drame est en cellule.
- Sur le Racine mort le Campistron pullule ! »
Boileau grinça des dents ; je lui dis :  « Ci-devant,
Silence ! » et je criai dans la foudre et le vent :
« Guerre à la rhétorique et paix à la syntaxe ! »
Et tout quatre-vingt-treize éclata. Sur leur axe,
On vit trembler l'athos, l'ithos et le pathos.
Les matassins, lâchant Pourceaugnac et Cathos,
Poursuivant Dumarsais dans leur hideux bastringue,
Des ondes du Permesse emplirent leur seringue.
La syllabe, enjambant la loi qui la tria,
Le substantif manant, le verbe paria,
Accoururent. On but l'horreur jusqu'à la lie.
On les vit déterrer le songe d'Athalie ;
Ils jetèrent au vent les cendres du récit
De Théramène ; et l'astre Institut s'obscurcit.
Oui, de l'ancien régime ils ont fait tables rases,
Et j'ai battu des mains, buveur du sang des phrases,
Quand j'ai vu par la strophe écumante et disant
Les choses dans un style énorme et rugissant,
L'Art poétique pris au collet dans la rue,
Et quand j'ai vu, parmi la foule qui se rue,
Pendre, par tous les mots que le bon goût proscrit,
La lettre aristocrate à la lanterne esprit.
Oui, je suis ce Danton ! je suis ce Robespierre !
J'ai, contre le mot noble à la longue rapière,
Insurgé le vocable ignoble, son valet,
Et j'ai, sur Dangeau mort, égorgé Richelet.
Oui, c'est vrai, ce sont là quelques-uns de mes crimes.
J'ai pris et démoli la bastille des rimes.
J'ai fait plus : j'ai brisé tous les carcans de fer
Qui liaient le mot peuple, et tiré de l'enfer
Tous les vieux mots damnés, légions sépulcrales ;
J'ai de la périphrase écrasé les spirales,
Et mêlé, confondu, nivelé sous le ciel
L'alphabet, sombre tour qui naquit de Babel ;
Et je n'ignorais pas que la main courroucée
Qui délivre le mot, délivre la pensée.

L'unité, des efforts de l'homme est l'attribut.
Tout est la même flèche et frappe au même but.

Donc, j'en conviens, voilà, déduits en style honnête,
Plusieurs de mes forfaits, et j'apporte ma tête.
Vous devez être vieux, par conséquent, papa,
Pour la dixième fois j'en fais meâ culpâ.
Oui, si Beauzée est dieu, c'est vrai, je suis athée.
La langue était en ordre, auguste, époussetée,
Fleur-de-lys d'or, Tristan et Boileau, plafond bleu,
Les quarante fauteuils et le trône au milieu ;
Je l'ai troublée, et j'ai, dans ce salon illustre,
Même un peu cassé tout ; le mot propre, ce rustre,
N'était que caporal : je l'ai fait colonel ;
J'ai fait un jacobin du pronom personnel ;
Dur participe, esclave à la tête blanchie,
Une hyène, et du verbe une hydre d'anarchie.

Vous tenez le reum confitentem. Tonnez !
J'ai dit à la narine : « Eh mais ! tu n'es qu'un nez !  »
J'ai dit au long fruit d'or : « Mais tu n'es qu'une poire !  »
J'ai dit à Vaugelas : « Tu n'es qu'une mâchoire ! »
J'ai dit aux mots : « Soyez république ! soyez
La fourmilière immense, et travaillez ! Croyez,
Aimez, vivez ! » -- J'ai mis tout en branle, et, morose,
J'ai jeté le vers noble aux chiens noirs de la prose.

Et, ce que je faisais, d'autres l'ont fait aussi ;
Mieux que moi. Calliope, Euterpe au ton transi,
Polymnie, ont perdu leur gravité postiche.
Nous faisons basculer la balance hémistiche.
C'est vrai, maudissez-nous. Le vers, qui, sur son front
Jadis portait toujours douze plumes en rond,
Et sans cesse sautait sur la double raquette
Qu'on nomme prosodie et qu'on nomme étiquette,
Rompt désormais la règle et trompe le ciseau,
Et s'échappe, volant qui se change en oiseau,
De la cage césure, et fuit vers la ravine,
Et vole dans les cieux, alouette divine.

Tous les mots à présent planent dans la clarté.
Les écrivains ont mis la langue en liberté.
Et, grâce à ces bandits, grâce à ces terroristes,
Le vrai, chassant l'essaim des pédagogues tristes,
L'imagination, tapageuse aux cent voix,
Qui casse des carreaux dans l'esprit des bourgeois ;
La poésie au front triple, qui rit, soupire
Et chante, raille et croit ; que Plaute et Shakspeare
Semaient, l'un sur la plebs, et l'autre sur le mob ;
Qui verse aux nations la sagesse de Job
Et la raison d'Horace à travers sa démence ;
Qu'enivre de l'azur la frénésie immense,
Et qui, folle sacrée aux regards éclatants,
Monte à l'éternité par les degrés du temps,

La muse reparaît, nous reprend, nous ramène,
Se remet à pleurer sur la misère humaine,
Frappe et console, va du zénith au nadir,
Et fait sur tous les fronts reluire et resplendir
Son vol, tourbillon, lyre, ouragan d'étincelles,
Et ses millions d'yeux sur ses millions d'ailes.

Le mouvement complète ainsi son action.
Grâce à toi, progrès saint, la Révolution
Vibre aujourd'hui dans l'air, dans la voix, dans le livre ;
Dans le mot palpitant le lecteur la sent vivre ;
Elle crie, elle chante, elle enseigne, elle rit,
Sa langue est déliée ainsi que son esprit.
Elle est dans le roman, parlant tout bas aux femmes.
Elle ouvre maintenant deux yeux où sont deux flammes,
L'un sur le citoyen, l'autre sur le penseur.
Elle prend par la main la Liberté, sa soeur,
Et la fait dans tout homme entrer par tous les pores.
Les préjugés, formés, comme les madrépores,
Du sombre entassement des abus sous les temps,
Se dissolvent au choc de tous les mots flottants,
Pleins de sa volonté, de son but, de son âme.
Elle est la prose, elle est le vers, elle est le drame ;
Elle est l'expression, elle est le sentiment,
Lanterne dans la rue, étoile au firmament.
Elle entre aux profondeurs du langage insondable ;
Elle souffle dans l'art, porte-voix formidable ;
Et, c'est Dieu qui le veut, après avoir rempli
De ses fiertés le peuple, effacé le vieux pli
Des fronts, et relevé la foule dégradée,
Et s'être faite droit, elle se fait idée !

Paris, janvier 1834.

Victor Hugo

C'est une émotion étrange

C'est une émotion étrange pour mon âme
De voir l'enfant, encor dans les bras de la femme,
Fleur ignorant l'hiver, ange ignorant Satan,
Secouant un hochet devant Léviathan,
Approcher doucement la nature terrible.
Les beaux séraphins bleus qui passent dans la bible,
Envolés d'on ne sait quel ciel mystérieux,
N'ont pas une plus pure aurore dans les yeux
Et n'ont pas sur le front une plus sainte flamme
Que l'enfant innocent riant au monstre infâme.
Ciel noir ! Quel vaste cri que le rugissement !
Quand la bête, âme aveugle et visage écumant,
Lance au ****, n'importe où, dans l'étendue hostile
Sa voix lugubre, ainsi qu'un sombre projectile,
C'est tout le gouffre affreux des forces sans clarté
Qui hurle ; c'est l'obscène et sauvage Astarté,
C'est la nature abjecte et maudite qui gronde ;
C'est Némée, et Stymphale, et l'Afrique profonde
C'est le féroce Atlas, c'est l'Athos plus hanté
Par les foudres qu'un lac par les mouches d'été ;
C'est Lerne, Pélion, Ossa, c'est Érymanthe,
C'est Calydon funeste et noir, qui se lamente.

L'enfant regarde l'ombre où sont les lions roux.
La bête grince ; à qui s'adresse ce courroux ?
L'enfant jase ; sait-on qui les enfants appellent ?
Les deux voix, la tragique et la douce se mêlent
L'enfant est l'espérance et la bête est la faim ;
Et tous deux sont l'attente ; il gazouille sans fin
Et chante, et l'animal écume sans relâche ;
Ils ont chacun en eux un mystère qui tâche
De dire ce qu'il sait et d'avoir ce qu'il veut
Leur langue est prise et cherche à dénouer le nœud.
Se parlent-ils ? Chacun fait son essai, l'un triste
L'autre charmant ; l'enfant joyeusement existe ;
Quoique devant lui l'Être effrayant soit debout
Il a sa mère, il a sa nourrice, il a tout ;
Il rit.

De quelle nuit sortent ces deux ébauches ?
L'une sort de l'azur ; l'autre de ces débauches,
De ces accouplements du nain et du géant,
De ce hideux baiser de l'abîme au néant
Qu'un nomme le chaos.

Oui, cette cave immonde,
Dont le soupirail blême apparaît sous le monde,
Le chaos, ces chocs noirs, ces danses d'ouragans,
Les éléments gâtés et devenus brigands
Et changés en fléaux dans le cloaque immense,
Le rut universel épousant la démence,
La fécondation de Tout produisant Rien,
Cet engloutissement du vrai, du beau, du bien,
Qu'Orphée appelle Hadès, qu'Homère appelle Érèbe,
Et qui rend fixe l'oeil fatal des sphinx de Thèbe,
C'est cela, c'est la folle et mauvaise action
Qu'en faisant le chaos fit la création,
C'est l'attaque de l'ombre au soleil vénérable,
C'est la convulsion du gouffre misérable
Essayant d'opposer l'informe à l'idéal,
C'est Tisiphone offrant son ventre à Bélial,
C'est cet ensemble obscur de forces échappées
Où les éclairs font rage et tirent leurs épées,
Où périrent Janus, l'âge d'or et Rhéa,
Qui, si nous en croyons les mages, procréa
L'animal ; et la bête affreuse fut rugie
Et vomie au milieu des nuits par cette orgie.

C'est de là que nous vient le monstre inquiétant.

L'enfant, lui, pur songeur rassurant et content,
Est l'autre énigme ; il sort de l'obscurité bleue.
Tous les petits oiseaux, mésange, hochequeue,
Fauvette, passereau, bavards aux fraîches voix,
Sont ses frères, tandis que ces marmots des bois
Sentent pousser leur aile, il sent croître son âme
Des azurs embaumés de myrrhe et de cinname,
Des entre-croisements de fleurs et de rayons,
Ces éblouissements sacrés que nous voyons
Dans nos profonds sommeils quand nous sommes des justes,
Un pêle-mêle obscur de branchages augustes
Dont les anges au vol divin sont les oiseaux,
Une lueur pareille au clair reflet des eaux
Quand, le soir, dans l'étang les arbres se renversent,
Des lys vivants, un ciel qui rit, des chants qui bercent,
Voilà ce que l'enfant, rose, a derrière lui.
Il s'éveille ici-bas, vaguement ébloui ;
Il vient de voir l'Eden et Dieu ; rien ne l'effraie,
Il ne croit pas au mal ; ni le loup, ni l'orfraie,
Ni le tigre, démon taché, ni ce trompeur,
Le renard, ne le font trembler ; il n'a pas peur,
Il chante ; et quoi de plus touchant pour la pensée
Que cette confiance au paradis, poussée
Jusqu'à venir tout près sourire au sombre enfer !
Quel ange que l'enfant ! Tout, le mal, sombre mer,
Les hydres qu'en leurs flots roulent les vils avernes,
Les griffes, ces forêts, les gueules, ces cavernes,
Les cris, les hurlements, les râles, les abois,
Les rauques visions, la fauve horreur des bois,
Tout, Satan, et sa morne et féroce puissance,
S'évanouit au fond du bleu de l'innocence !
C'est beau. Voir Caliban et rester Ariel !
Avoir dans son humble âme un si merveilleux ciel
Que l'apparition indignée et sauvage
Des êtres de la nuit n'y fasse aucun ravage,
Et se sentir si plein de lumière et si doux
Que leur souffle n'éteigne aucune étoile en vous !

Et je rêve. Et je crois entendre un dialogue
Entre la tragédie effroyable et l'églogue ;
D'un côté l'épouvante, et de l'autre l'amour ;
Dans l'une ni dans l'autre il ne fait encor jour ;
L'enfant semble vouloir expliquer quelque chose ;
La bête gronde, et, monstre incliné sur la rose,
Écoute... - Et qui pourrait comprendre, ô firmament,
Ce que le bégaiement dit au rugissement ?

Quel que soit le secret, tout se dresse et médite,
La fleur bénie ainsi que l'épine maudite ;
Tout devient attentif ; tout tressaille ; un frisson
Agite l'air, le flot, la branche, le buisson,
Et dans les clairs-obscurs et dans les crépuscules,
Dans cette ombre où jadis combattaient les Hercules,
Où les Bellérophons s'envolaient, où planait
L'immense Amos criant : Un nouveau monde naît !
On sent on ne sait quelle émotion sacrée,
Et c'est, pour la nature où l'éternel Dieu crée,
C'est pour tout le mystère un attendrissement
Comme si l'on voyait l'aube au rayon calmant
S'ébaucher par-dessus d'informes promontoires,
Quand l'âme blanche vient parler aux âmes noires.

Victor Hugo

Le rétablissement de la statue de Henri IV

I.

Je voyais s'élever, dans le lointain des âges,
Ces monuments, espoir de cent rois glorieux ;
Puis je voyais crouler les fragiles images
De ces fragiles demi-dieux.
Alexandre, un pêcheur des rives du Pirée
Foule ta statue ignorée
Sur le pavé du Parthénon ;
Et les premiers rayons de la naissante aurore
En vain dans le désert interrogent encore
Les muets débris de Memnon.

Qu'ont-ils donc prétendu, dans leur esprit superbe,
Qu'un bronze inanimé dût les rendre immortels ?
Demain le temps peut-être aura caché sous l'herbe
Leurs imaginaires autels.
Le proscrit à son tour peut remplacer l'idole ;
Des piédestaux du Capitole
Sylla détrône Marius.
Aux outrages du sort insensé qui s'oppose !
Le sage, de l'affront dont frémit Théodose,
Sourit avec Démétrius.

D'un héros toutefois l'image auguste et chère
Hérite du respect qui payait ses vertus ;
Trajan domine encore les champs que de Tibère
Couvrent les temples abattus.
Souvent, lorsqu'en l'horreur des discordes civiles,
La terreur planait sur les villes,
Aux cris des peuples révoltés,
Un héros, respirant dans le marbre immobile,
Arrêtait tout à coup par son regard tranquille
Les factieux épouvantés.

II.

Eh quoi ! sont-ils donc ****, ces jours de notre histoire
Où Paris sur son prince osa lever son bras ?
Où l'aspect de Henri, ses vertus, sa mémoire,
N'ont pu désarmer des ingrats ?
Que dis-je ? ils ont détruit sa statut adorée.
Hélas ! cette horde égarée
Mutilait l'airain renversé ;
Et cependant, des morts souillant le saint asile,
Leur sacrilège main demandait à l'argile
L'empreinte de son front glacé !

Voulaient-ils donc jouir d'un portrait plus fidèle
Du héros dont leur haine a payé les bienfaits ?
Voulaient-ils, réprouvant leur fureur criminelle,
Le rendre à nos yeux satisfaits ?
Non ; mais c'était trop peu de briser son image ;
Ils venaient encor, dans leur rage,
Briser son cercueil outragé ;
Tel, troublant le désert d'un rugissement sombre,
Le tigre, en se jouant, cherche à dévorer l'ombre
Du cadavre qu'il a rongé.

Assis près de la Seine, en mes douleurs amères,
Je me disais : « La Seine arrose encore Ivry,
Et les flots sont passés où, du temps de nos père,
Se peignaient les traits de Henri.
Nous ne verrons jamais l'image vénérée
D'un roi qu'à la France éplorée
Enleva sitôt le trépas ;
Sans saluer Henri nous irons aux batailles,
Et l'étranger viendra chercher dans nos murailles
Un héros qu'il n'y verra pas. »

III.

Où courez-vous ? - Quel bruit naît, s'élève et s'avance ?
Qui porte ces drapeaux, signe heureux de nos rois ?
Dieu ! quelle masse au **** semble, en sa marche immense,
Broyer la terre sous son poids ?
Répondez... Ciel ! c'est lui ! je vois sa noble tête...
Le peuple, fier de sa conquête,
Répète en chœur son nom chéri.
Ô ma lyre ! tais-toi dans la publique ivresse ;
Que seraient tes concerts près des chants d'allégresse
De la France aux pieds de Henri ?

Par mille bras traîné, le lourd colosse roule.
Ah ! volons, joignons-nous à ces efforts pieux.
Qu'importe si mon bras est perdu dans la foule !
Henri me voit du haut des cieux.
Tout un peuple a voué ce bronze à ta mémoire,
Ô chevalier, rival en gloire
Des Bayard et des Duguesclin !
De l'amour des français reçois la noble preuve,
Nous devons ta statue au denier de la veuve,
À l'obole de l'orphelin.

N'en doutez pas, l'aspect de cette image auguste
Rendra nos maux moins grands, notre bonheur plus doux ;
Ô français ! louez Dieu, vous voyez un roi juste,
Un français de plus parmi vous.
Désormais, dans ses yeux, en volant à la gloire,
Nous viendrons puiser la victoire ;
Henri recevra notre foi ;
Et quand on parlera de ses vertus si chères,
Nos enfants n'iront pas demander à nos pères
Comment souriait le bon roi !

IV.

Jeunes amis, dansez autour de cette enceinte ;
Mêlez vos pas joyeux, mêlez vos heureux chants ;
Henri, car sa bonté dans ses traits est empreinte,
Bénira vos transports touchants.
Près des vains monuments que des tyrans s'élèvent,
Qu'après de longs siècles achèvent
Les travaux d'un peuple opprimé.
Qu'il est beau, cet airain où d'un roi tutélaire
La France aime à revoir le geste populaire
Et le regard accoutumé !

Que le fier conquérant de la Perse avilie,
Las de léguer ses traits à de frêles métaux,
Menace, dans l'accès de sa vaste folie,
D'imposer sa forme à l'Athos ;
Qu'un Pharaon cruel, superbe en sa démence,
Couvre d'un obélisque immense
Le grand néant de son cercueil ;
Son nom meurt, et bientôt l'ombre des Pyramides
Pour l'étranger, perdu dans ces plaines arides,
Est le seul bienfait de l'orgueil.

Un jour (mais repoussons tout présage funeste !)
Si des ans ou du sort les coups encor vainqueurs
Brisaient de notre amour le monument modeste,
Henri, tu vivrais dans nos cœurs ;
Cependant que du Nil les montagnes altières,
Cachant cent royales poussières,
Du monde inutile fardeau,
Du temps et de la mort attestent le passage,
Et ne sont déjà plus, à l'œil ému du sage,
Que la ruine d'un tombeau.

Février 1819.

Victor Hugo

À M. David, statuaire

D'hommes tu nous fais dieux.
RÉGNIER.

Oh ! que ne suis-je un de ces hommes
Qui, géants d'un siècle effacé,
Jusque dans le siècle où nous sommes
Règnent du fond de leur passé !
Que ne suis-je, prince ou poète,
De ces mortels à haute tête,
D'un monde à la fois base et faîte,
Que leur temps ne peut contenir ;
Qui, dans le calme ou dans l'orage,
Qu'on les adore ou les outrage,
Devançant le pas de leur âge,
Marchent un pied dans l'avenir !

Que ne suis-je une de ces flammes,
Un de ces pôles glorieux,
Vers qui penchent toutes les âmes,
Sur qui se fixent tous les yeux !
De ces hommes dont les statues,
Du flot des temps toujours battues,
D'un tel signe sont revêtues
Que, si le hasard les abat,
S'il les détrône de leur sphère,
Du bronze auguste on ne peut faire
Que des cloches pour la prière
Ou des canons pour le combat !

Que n'ai-je un de ces fronts sublimes,
David ! Mon corps, fait pour souffrir,
Du moins sous tes mains magnanimes
Renaîtrait pour ne plus mourir !
Du haut du temple ou du théâtre,
Colosse de bronze ou d'albâtre,
Salué d'un peuple idolâtre,
Je surgirais sur la cité,
Comme un géant en sentinelle,
Couvrant la ville de mon aile,
Dans quelque attitude éternelle
De génie et de majesté !

Car c'est toi, lorsqu'un héros tombe,
Qui le relèves souverain !
Toi qui le scelles sur sa tombe
Qu'il foule avec des pieds d'airain !
Rival de Rome et de Ferrare,
Tu pétris pour le mortel rare
Ou le marbre froid de Carrare,
Ou le métal qui fume et bout.
Le grand homme au tombeau s'apaise
Quand ta main, à qui rien ne pèse,
Hors du bloc ou de la fournaise
Le jette vivant et debout !

Sans toi peut-être sa mémoire
Pâlirait d'un oubli fatal ;
Mais c'est toi qui sculptes sa gloire
Visible sur un piédestal.
Ce fanal, perdu pour le monde,
Feu rampant dans la nuit profonde,
S'éteindrait, sans montrer sur l'onde
Ni les écueils ni le chemin.
C'est ton souffle qui le ranime ;
C'est toi qui, sur le sombre abîme,
Dresses le colosse sublime
Qui prend le phare dans sa main.

Lorsqu'à tes yeux une pensée
Sous les traits d'un grand homme a lui,
Tu la fais marbre, elle est fixée,
Et les peuples disent : C'est lui !
Mais avant d'être pour la foule,
Longtemps dans ta tête elle roule
Comme une flamboyante houle
Au fond du volcan souterrain ;
**** du grand jour qui la réclame
Tu las fais bouillir dans ton âme :
Ainsi de ses langues de flamme
Le feu saisit l'urne d'airain.

Va ! que nos villes soient remplies
De tes colosses radieux !
Qu'à jamais tu te multiplies
Dans un peuple de demi-dieux !
Fais de nos cités des Corinthes !
Oh ! ta pensée a des étreintes
Dont l'airain garde les empreintes,
Dont le granit s'enorgueillit !
Honneur au sol que ton pied foule !
Un métal dans tes veines coule ;
Ta tête ardente est un grand moule
D'où l'idée en bronze jaillit !

Bonaparte eût voulu renaître
De marbre et géant sous ta main ;
Cromwell, son aïeul et son maître,
T'eût livré son front surhumain ;
Ton bras eût sculpté pour l'Espagne
Charles-Quint ; pour nous, Charlemagne,
Un pied sur l'hydre d'Allemagne,
L'autre sur Rome aux sept coteaux ;
Au sépulcre prêt à descendre,
César t'eût confié sa cendre,
Et c'est toi qu'eût pris Alexandre
Pour lui tailler le mont Athos !

Juillet 1829.

Théophile Gautier

Niobé

Sur un quartier de roche, un fantôme de marbre,

Le menton dans la main et le coude au genou,

Les pieds pris dans le sol, ainsi que des pieds d'arbre,

Pleure éternellement sans relever le cou.

Quel chagrin pèse donc sur ta tête abattue ?

À quel puits de douleurs tes yeux puisent-ils l'eau ?

Et que souffres-tu donc dans ton cœur de statue,

Pour que ton sein sculpté soulève ton manteau ?

Tes larmes, en tombant du coin de ta paupière,

Goutte à goutte, sans cesse et sur le même endroit,

Ont fait dans l'épaisseur de ta cuisse de pierre

Un creux où le bouvreuil trempe son aile et boit.

Ô symbole muet de l'humaine misère,

Niobé sans enfants, mère des sept douleurs,

Assise sur l'Athos ou bien sur le Calvaire,

Quel fleuve d'Amérique est plus grand que tes pleurs ?

— The End —