"Player Dog Rest in Peace" & The Power of the Arts

cover of "Player Dog Rest in Peace"

A friend of mine posted on Facebook that, as she was going through old folders, she found a copy of the poetry chapbook I published back in 1996, titled "Player Dog Rest in Peace". I shared the cover on Facebook and several friends remember and/or still have a copy of it!

Seeing the post from someone else reminded me how happy I am that I put out the effort to publish this. I didn't make much money (I covered the printing costs and had enough extra to buy a nice dinner during a night out with friends). And it didn't "lead anywhere" (i.e., I'm not a famous poet). However I've long since learned that, if we only do things that make money or lead somewhere, that we're missing some of life's most enriching opportunities and experiences. I learned a lot from creating and publishing "Player Dog Rest in Peace".

The power of this chapbook is what it conjures up in me. I smiled the instant I saw the picture posted by my friend, because a flood of memories associated with it and the poetry it contains - which was all written during my first few years living in Chicago - came to mind:

• Reading "Intro to Urban" at the Green Mill with a jazz trio playing "Cantaloupe Island" behind me
• Afternoons and evenings hanging out at La Piazza coffeehouse on Broadway
• Being a featured poet in the Poets Alive! series at Cafe Voltaire
• My experience of love at first sight, which ended very sadly within days and led me to write "Dominoes", a poem published by four publications within a few months
• Having over a dozen poems published in various small press zines
• Performing my gay rap song "Icebreaker" at Pong Jam (again with a band behind me)
• Lifting interesting phrases from opaque personals in The Reader (the title for the poem "Apocalypse Surfer" being one) 
• Seeing rapper Guru perform live with jazz legend Donald Byrd (and Vanessa Daou opening)
• All the crazy little theatre venues: Annoyance Theatre, Torso Theatre, and the Neofuturarium
• Discovering Sartre and Nikki Giovanni and loads of other writers while riding the el to wherever I might have been going at any particular time
• Seeing a tour bus go by and then realizing in shock that someone was taking a picture of me(?)
• All the fun I had drawing the cover, designing the book, and playing with fonts
• Sitting in the window of my third floor walk-up, with my feet dangling into space and writing as the sun set, while listening to the latest acid jazz CD I'd picked up at Evil Clown Records 
• Going out for Ethiopian food with friends and finding a man there playing a giant kora harp
• The joy of completing large poems like "The City is Made of Music" and "I am Pete; I Be Writing"

This period of my life seemed to be one moment like this after another, and it lasted something like three years. It was one of the best times of my life, partly because I was writing, publishing, and performing so much but also because what I was writing was such a perfect prism of my experiences in the city as well as all the things going on in my life. I was writing very personal poetry and creating a kind of private language, yet it was all very accessible work that captured a place and time in words. At the tail end of it, I met Jim and - before I knew it - one chapter of life came to an end and another began.

As for the title of the chapbook? When I was a little kid and we drove into the city, I always remember seeing this overpass where someone had spray painted the phrase "player dog rest in peace". For me, this was the gateway to Chicago. While I always wondered who wrote the graffiti and why, I'm glad I never found out and it remains a question mark. Anyway, after I moved into the city (as I'd wanted to do for most of my life), that overpass graffiti immediately suggested itself as the ideal title for this chapbook I was making to compile all the poetry that encapsulated my experiences in Chicago.

Almost two decades have gone by. The overpass graffiti has been erased, La Piazza is closed, Evil Clown and Cafe Voltaire are both gone, and the neighborhood I lived in is a lot more like Lincoln Park than the diverse, quirky, rough around the edges community I remember. And I'm different too. I'm definitely not that brassy little gamin with the oversized clothes and backwards baseball cap (think The Little Rascals with a grunge/hip-hop make-over) who moved to the city to - as I wrote in the poem "Intro to Urban" - "walk rainbow streets/and take a hit on the blunt of life".

I'm writing about this, because it's an example of one of the most powerful things about art - our own or anyone else's. Art encodes itself into our lives and captures parts of our lives like gas giant planets with a hundred tiny moons in orbit. When we experience that painting or song or poem again, we get to go back and relive those memories and feelings again.

"On Monsieur's Departure" - Queen Elizabeth I

Queen Elizabeth I, circa 1575
artist unknown
Oil on panel, 113 x 78.7 cm

One last poem for National Poetry Month!

Ever since I heard Glenda Jackson read this poem as she played Elizabeth I in the BBC series Elizabeth R, I haven't been able to get it out of my head. The music of the words, the opposition in the images, and the melancholy cadence just come together in a unique way. Plus there's the fact that it's a tantalizing glimpse into the mind and heart of a well-known - yet enigmatic and private - ruler.

Elizabeth wrote this poem shortly after ending her courtship with the Duke of Alencon, which was likely her last chance at a married life and for children of her own to continue the Tudor dynasty. 

For my part, I have always believed that Elizabeth never meant to marry and not for any of the overly dramatic or weird medical reasons put forth by historians. It seems perfectly reasonable to me that a highly intelligent woman, like Elizabeth, who had power and security would never wish to give up either to a husband. 

Even so, she must have had some moments of regret about having to make this choice. And I've always read that regret in these lines. I doubt she truly second-guessed her choice, as it was the only choice that made sense for her, but all of us sometimes wonder - in our introspective moments - what if...

On Monsieur's Departure

I grieve and dare not show my discontent,

I love and yet am forced to seem to hate,

I do, yet dare not say I ever meant,

I seem stark mute but inwardly do prate.

    I am and not, I freeze and yet am burned,

    Since from myself another self I turned.

My care is like my shadow in the sun,

Follows me flying, flies when I pursue it,

Stands and lies by me, doth what I have done.

His too familiar care doth make me rue it.

    No means I find to rid him from my breast,

    Till by the end of things it be supprest.

Some gentler passion slide into my mind,

For I am soft and made of melting snow;

Or be more cruel, love, and so be kind.

Let me or float or sink, be high or low.

    Or let me live with some more sweet content,

    Or die and so forget what love ere meant.

- Queen Elizabeth I

After Hours

Photo: Dave Dugdale/Flickr Creative Commons

Having fun going through my backlog of poetry to celebrate National Poetry Month...

I wrote 'After Hours' back in 1997 or 1998, during my last year living in Chicago proper. Techno music and its related sub-genres were bubbling just under the surface of pop culture, threatening to cross over and revitalize pop music. Unfortunately, this never really happened. However, it made for an exciting time to be into music and living in a city like Chicago where the dance music scene was so vibrant.

During this time, I was also reading very deeply about theoretical physics and planetary science. It was only natural that the science and music - two very different sources of inspiration - would surface in some fused format within the imagery of my poetry.

After Hours

Black garbed,
svelte,
I rave solo -
a gold ankh
painted on my jeans
to say more
than words.

Addicted to goa trance,
tangential to the cliques,
like a mix
I don't stop.
I get on up,
then chill
and feel the DJ
til the cops come.

Afterwards -
on moonless nights -
I 5AM cab
to the sea
and watch starlight
shining from galaxies
I'll never visit
glisten on the waves
washing to my feet.

I am not small;
the universe is big.

- Peter Cholewinski

The Power of Words

In another post, I compared writing rhymed poetry with spell casting, mainly referring to the rhythm of the poem when it's read or spoken. However, it also occurs to me that poetry is like spell casting because it makes such powerful use of words.

Unlike prose, poetry doesn't use or need full sentences. A good poem condenses meaning so as to be conveyed by a fraction of the words used in a story or novel. By choosing the most powerful words to convey all the nuance intended, poetry taps the power of words more than any other form of written communication. It takes into account connotation and denotation, they way things sound, and how it flows.

"Words are, in my not so humble opinion, our most inexhaustible source of magic, capable of both inflicting injury and remedying it." - Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part II

If You Have No Wings

As April is National Poetry Month...

2014 has not been an easy year so far and, as often happens in such situations, this poem comes to mind. I wrote it in 1987 when I was transitioning (slowly) through college and into full, independent adulthood. At that time, I didn't have a plan. My friends had all gone away to college, I hadn't admitted to myself I was gay, I didn't know what I wanted to do career-wise, and - most difficult - I didn't have a passion to drive my life. I felt myself idling when I had a lot of big decisions to make. It was all too big and overwhelming to think about.

I started writing 'If You Have No Wings' to vent. Only during the writing process, did the poem change from a venting session into a solution (note how it changes between first person and me telling myself what to do - not a conscious thing!). Poetry and art have often served me in this manner. I can feel my way through something that I can't assess in a linear or logical manner.

I've re-read this poem at several tough times during life. And, just like when I wrote it, it doesn't give me any answers. It reminds me we don't need answers to live. Taking a small step causes the next step to suggest itself. Before long, there's a path. That can be all the answer we need and, sometimes, all the answer there is.

If You Have No Wings

So the angel said,
"Fly to me."

I have no wings.
I have no things
that shall let me do
that which I cannot.

But all our wisdom
is limited by poor vision,
and the powers we possess
stunted by indecision.

So if you have no wings -
then walk!
If you have not the things -
then do without!

Someday I will be
greater...wiser,
but for now,
I must do without.

- Peter Cholewinski

"Invictus" - William Ernest Henley

It's national poetry month again! My first post for the month is this inspirational poem written by Wiliam Ernest Henley when he was 17 and recovering from having one of his legs amputated. It's a great anthem.

Invictus

Out of the night that covers me, 
Black as the Pit from pole to pole, 
I thank whatever gods may be 
For my unconquerable soul. 

In the fell clutch of circumstance 
I have not winced nor cried aloud. 
Under the bludgeonings of chance 
My head is bloody, but unbowed. 

Beyond this place of wrath and tears 
Looms but the Horror of the shade, 
And yet the menace of the years 
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid. 

It matters not how strait the gate, 
How charged with punishments the scroll, 
I am the master of my fate: 
I am the captain of my soul.

"Haiku Beads"

Over the past three years I've sporadically written haiku after zazen or solving a koan. It's been an attempt to preserve things I experience so they don't slip away. Sort of like trying to freeze cascading water with a fish inside so you can come back to see it later.

Over the last year, I got the idea to look through the haiku I'd written (many of which are posted here on Zen Thrown Down) and see if I could string some of them together into a longer work. Sort of like making a string of beads with haiku.

I finally got around to trying it this morning, and it was pretty easy to do. Within a few minutes, I was able to string together four haiku that shared a seasonal theme and which, when put together, seemed to build on each other.

Coolest part? The order in which the haiku are arranged in the poem below is the same as the order in which they were written during the past three years. My mind brims with the possible meanings inherent in that fact!

Learning To Stop

Howling winter night
All creation takes shelter
I pursue the wolves

I run
forget my aim
gasping

Cold moon through branches
casting shadows on deep snow
Silent solitude

Walk like the elephant
In one breath the wind goes by
endless as starlight

- Peter Cholewinski

Stone Worn Smooth

During one phase of my poetry writing, it was a trademark of mine to rely on arcane mythological references. This often made the poems feel very formal and kind of erudite. During another phase, I stuffed my work with a self-created, private form of urban slang. These approaches all provided a definite feel I was going after. In the last decade or so, and especially with poetry I write in verse, I've backed away from anything like this. 

The images and language I've been using feels a lot more down to earth - and perhaps the work is less original because of that. However, there is an unassuming, direct feeling this approach brings that I like. It feels like the difference between a Johnny Cash song and a Pink Floyd song. Pink Floyd is harder to relate to (or even understand) and so they can come off as abstract and a little pompous. In contrast, a guy like Johnny Cash is always visceral. He speaks a truth, kicks dirt over it, and moves on. I think in my forties I've moved much more towards a Johnny Cash kind of poetry that is more direct. In fact, if I could sing (at all), I would probably be writing all my recent poems as songs rather than poetry.

I wrote the initial version of 'Stone Worn Smooth' back in November and only today felt a need to write and, in so doing, found it again. It only took a couple hours to finish it this morning. In working it, I once again ended up with five five-line stanzas. Totally accidental, but it's kind of interesting to me that in these past couple years no matter how a piece starts it often winds up in something close to this format.

Stone Worn Smooth

Sand and grit and chert

I'm fused in jagged latticework

Untold pressure

primeval pyre

I came into this world on fire

Wave and wind and storm

freeze me hard 'til seasons warm

Tossed and battered

yet relishing the fray

I seek new scars in every day

Acts and thoughts and words

I speak so loud but am not heard

Raging forth

then poker faced

Ever restarting this winless race

Now upon a sandy shore

free of all that came before

All I've lost

All I've gained

Makes no difference to what remains

I have soared with galaxies

I've drunk my tears while on my knees

Say I've lost

Say I've won

With all these names I am done

- Peter Cholewinski

Haiku Thursday

It's been a while since I did a Haiku Thursday post (largely because I haven't been writing any!). This one came to me while I was in zazen after doing my first walking meditation.

Walk like the elephant
In one breath the tide goes out
endless as starlight

French Symbolist Poetry

It's still National Poetry Month and Jim and I are planning a trip to Paris, so it seems appropriate to find an example of French poetry to post. I came across this piece on a website which had it labeled as symbolist poetry. Not sure if this is correct or not, but since I've been reading and posting about symbolism I figured that makes three connections! Plus, I love the vibe of this poem. The translation is by Alex Gross.

Dommange's poem was apparently set to jazz music at some point. Not sure if that was contemporary with the piece or later.

Jazz In The Night

The dance, on the flaming park casts its multi-
colored flowers, the trees are singed,
irradiated, and the sonorous roaring of
crazed and homesick blacks

Nervous tangos, harsh brass, choke the soft
rustling of satin that paws the grass.

What exhausted smiles, by the shadow
of complicit copses, beneath the
surprise of kisses
consent and swoon. a saxophone
weeping long and very tender
plaints, sooths with its breathless
rhythm the excitement of furtive
embraces.

Passer-by, pick up this handkerchief, fallen
from a warm bosom this evening,
hidden under the ivy.

Two red lips signed it in the make-up
of their cool design, delivering up
its secrets for you , the perfume of
a naked throat and the mouth of
an unknown woman.

- Rene Dommange (1928)

"Ego Tripping" - Nikki Giovanni

One of my favorite poems of all time is this one by Nikki Giovanni. I read it for the first time when I was just out of college, had come out relatively recently, discovered acid jazz and hip hop, was doing open mic readings, and moved into the city to live on my own for the first time (college doesn't really count). Nikki Giovanni was just one of many mind-opening ingredients in a potpourri of inputs that mentally made me over during that time. It was one of the most exciting times of my life, and every time I read this poem the images and feelings I had then come back to me.

While some might claim this is a poem for African Americans or women, I totally felt it was about me embracing life and enjoying it by stealing god's car and driving away while blasting music with the top down!

It's a good set of feelings to remember. Thanks Nikki!

Ego Tripping (There May Be a Reason Why)

I was born in the congo
I walked to the fertile crescent and built
    the sphinx
I designed a pyramid so tough that a star
    that only glows every one hundred years falls
    into the center giving divine perfect light
I am bad

I sat on the throne
    drinking nectar with allah
I got hot and sent an ice age to europe
    to cool my thirst
My oldest daughter is nefertiti
    the tears from my birth pains
    created the nile
I am a beautiful woman

I gazed on the forest and burned
    out the sahara desert
    with a packet of goat's meat
    and a change of clothes
I crossed it in two hours
I am a gazelle so swift
    so swift you can't catch me

    For a birthday present when he was three
I gave my son hannibal an elephant
    He gave me rome for mother's day
My strength flows ever on

My son noah built new/ark and
I stood proudly at the helm
    as we sailed on a soft summer day
I turned myself into myself and was
    jesus
    men intone my loving name
    All praises All praises
I am the one who would save

I sowed diamonds in my back yard
My bowels deliver uranium
    the filings from my fingernails are
    semi-precious jewels
    On a trip north
I caught a cold and blew
My nose giving oil to the arab world
I am so hip even my errors are correct
I sailed west to reach east and had to round off
    the earth as I went
    The hair from my head thinned and gold was laid
    across three continents

I am so perfect so divine so ethereal so surreal
I cannot be comprehended except by my permission

I mean...I...can fly
    like a bird in the sky...

- Nikki Giovanni

More Poetry Inspired by Art

La branche de fleurs, 1906
Henri Matisse
Oil on canvas, 40 x 31.8 cm

Here's another poem I wrote back in 1999 that was inspired by a work or art. This time my muse was Henri Matisse and a much less well-known work of his: Branch of Flowers. There's no quality photos of this work, so I snapped this photo from a Matisse retrospective I own (so the quality is not the greatest).

Matisse is one of my favorite artists, largely due to his use of color, and it's pretty obvious my own approach to art references his style pretty heavily. I also admire how his work evolved over the course of his life, and that he tried new things. Also, his creativity was unstoppable. Late in his life (I believe he could no longer work at an easel), he switched to cutting out colored paper and creating collages. He had an innate need to visually express himself.

Branch of Flowers

Laughing vivacious
she pauses
eyes lowered
over a branch
of magnolia blossoms
as delicate
as her hand
as white
as her skin

Thoughts in her face
and magnolias
joined and freed
to fly forever
in my memory
like birds

- Peter Cholewinski

"I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud" - William Wordsworth

William Wordsworth (1770 - 1850) was one of the poets who ushered in Romanticism. Very much inspired by nature, he was a big influence on Transcendentalism in the United States. He also avoided the elevated language of the poets of his day, believing plain-spoken language made the best poetry. To him, poetry was not an academic pursuit but "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings". As we approach spring, he seems like a good voice to share for National Poetry Month.

I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of the bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee;
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company;
I gazed - and gazed - but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

Robert Herrick

Robert Herrick

Robert Herrick (1591 - 1674) is relatively minor 17th Century English poet. I was exposed to him during a wonderful course I took in 17th century English literature at college. While Herrick certainly isn't as critically lauded as the metaphysical poets like John Donne, I found his work refreshingly lyrical compared to the sometimes ponderous works of some of his contemporaries.  This one seems especially apropos for celebrating poetry during National Poetry Month.

His Poetry His Pillar

Only a little  more
I have to write;
Then I'll give o'er,
And bid the world good night.

'Tis but a flying minute
That I must stay,
Or linger in it;
And then I must away.

O Time, that cut'st down all,
And scarce leav'st here
Memorial
Of any men that were!

How many lie forgot
In vaults beneath,
And piecemeal rot
Without a fame in death!

Behold this living stone
I rear for me,
Ne'er to be thrown
Down, envious Time, by thee.

Pillars let some set up,
If so they please;
Here is my hope,
And my pyramids.

- Robert Herrick

Poetry Inspired by Art

Still Life Before an Open Window: Place Ravignan, 1915
Juan Gris
Oil on canvas, 166 x 89 cm

During National Poetry Month I post pieces from some of my favorite poets. I also dig into my journals for stuff from my past. In early 1999, I did something that I'd never done up to that point and which I have never done again: used great works of art as inspiration for poetry. 'Premonition' came very quickly (in only two drafts) as a result of my response to this painting by cubist Juan Gris, and it was published that year in a small press publication.

The photo here is big enough so that if you click on it you can see an enlarged version.

Premonition

No more wine or bread

Headlines of insanity

Marguerite plays violin -

a sombre vibrato

falling from our balcony

with autumn leaves

to the crowded boulevard

unheeded

For a moment

the boulevard

the town itself

this sunset and empty wine glass

the violin and newspaper

our crisp white tablecloth

pulse with a nausea

of some madman's creation

- Peter Cholewinski

Another Poem With Zen Flavoring

April is National Poetry Month, so it's great that I seem to be on a roll. Surprisingly, I've written another piece that makes use of Zen learning. Sometimes poetry happens most easily when you just let it flow.

Away With Words

You share your revelations -
pearly wisdom divine -
but they run like rain on roofs
when the epiphanies are not mine

The light of answers given
is visions darkest curse,
and enlightenment only heard
leads to its reverse

The lotus of a patriarch
is nirvana of little use,
for we bloom within experience
and cannot receive the truth

- Peter Cholewinski

Man Of My Dreams

No, this is not about Jim. Of course, you'll know that by the tone. Just like the last couple pieces I've written, the seed of this poem was a dream.  I woke from it mentally composing the first several lines of this poem.

After the long dry spell I've had as a writer, I have now written three poems in a month! Also, I don't think I've ever written so many rhyming poems at one time. Maybe just getting back in the swing of things?

Man Of My Dreams

Might of a lion
speed of gazelle
What you desire from me
I cannot tell

Muscular arms
carry me away
as I'm penetrated throughout
by the gentlest gaze

I scent a mate
or perhaps I'm beguiled
by the musk of conquest
that returns to the wild

Might must be free
speed never tamed
and our word wary tongues
leave all unexplained

Animal instincts
see predator and prey
You never say "I love you"
I'm running away

- Peter Cholewinski

Wind and Stone

I'd previously posted a poem I wrote a while ago called Ghosts. In this poem I compared writing poetry to being 'a spellcaster'. Part of me has always found something supernatural or magical about the creation process, and poetry - especially when it has rhythm and rhymes - can have the cadence of a spell being chanted. This poem came to me as an image when I was either falling asleep or waking up. Of course, this just fires my imagination as these 'in between' times are associated with magic and witchcraft in mythology.

Wind and Stone, which I just finished today, has nothing to do with either magic or witchcraft. Instead, it's one of the few times I've been able to work a concept from my Zen studies into a poem. That, and the fact it's the second poem I've written in less than a month, makes me happy.

Wind and Stone

Saharan winds
carry the scent of burning feathers,
promising rebirth
where the sand and sky blurs

Wary of mirages,
I built my oasis upon this crag of stone;
amid the sand and grit,
I need not crave nor atone

Decade after decade,
caravans cross the landscape
like dunes seduced by the wind,
forsaking permanence and shape

Sun burnt and leather-cracked,
they exalt in an endless journey,
while I mistrust visions
which as mirages ever fly before me

Departing at dawn
they quicken their pace,
unaware that we are destined
to find ourselves in every place

- Peter Cholewinski

A New Poem!

It's been almost a year and a half since I wrote a poem of any kind. Yesterday, I had this knot in my stomach and was feeling very 'stopped up' emotionally. As if something was going to explode, and yet I didn't know what or why. As it got worse, I suddenly had this powerful urge to write. It was like an act of desperation to purge what I was feeling. And it helped.

As I mentioned in a prior post, most poems I write are not rhymed. However, when I do write a rhymed poem, it's often in an attempt to be direct about something. The structure of the rhyme and rhythm force me to think and then images take form around what I feel and...out it comes. I wrote this in ten or twenty minutes and only did minor edits to it. It's a rough little ditty, but I'm pleased to have written something!

Baedeker Blues

I am an anagram
whose letters spell no words
My feet mired in earth
while I'm dreaming of birds

My compass spins
between what I feel and know
I doubt my direction
but my map says to go

Tears in my eyes
I take all the blame
Wondering if every road
would have ended the same

Looking forward does not help
for I'm coasting on prior dreams
whose realized realities
carry me off in chaotic streams

It's time to stop it all
running to nothing, regretting could-have-beens
Brave an uncharted path
until I am happy again

- Peter Cholewinski

C.P. Cavafy

C.P. Cavafy was a Greek poet (born in 1863) who lived much of his life in Alexandria, Egypt. He isn't an especially well known poet, although he did publish during his lifetime and seems to have been read by some of the avant-garde writers of the day (such as Gide).  I was drawn to him because of several factors, the main two being that he used Classical motifs and characters as inspirations in his poetry (something I liked doing for quite a while) and that he was open - and apologetically open - about being gay.

Many of his poems are love poems to and about gay men, which the author of the introduction to the hardcover volume of his poetry that I bought recently suggests may be why Cavafy did not publish more work. Back then, naturally, it was not acceptable to be out.

I've picked up several works by writers who were openly gay at around the turn of the century, so hopefully I'll get to reading them soon. I've always been fascinated by the first 20-25 years of the 20th Century. It seems like such a heady time, with all the rebellion in painting and writing, music and philosophy. And I've always wondered how fantastic and exciting it would have been to be in Paris at this period, which seemed like such an epicenter of the new culture of bohemians, intellectuals, and radicals. Reading gay men at that time seems like an interesting project!

Anyway, Cavafy has a rather unique writing style for his time. He seems to be blank verse yet very direct in his writing, a clarity which seems opposed to some of the work that would come after him. And yet he was devoid of the flowery trappings of poets before him and perhaps of his own time.  I was struck by this particular piece written in about 1910 - one of his more famous - called Ithaca.  The message is clear and well-expressed, and the references to the Odyssey speak to his fascination with ancient Greek and Roman culture. I also really like the cadence of the words; they flow with a meter as patient and quiet as the speed of travel the work recommends to us in life.

Ithaca
(translation by Daniel Mendelsohn)

As you set out on the way to Ithaca
hope that the road is a long one,
filled with adventures, filled with discoveries.
The Laestrygonians and the Cyclopes,
Poseidon in his anger: do not fear them,
you won't find such things on your way
so long as your thoughts remain lofty, and a choice
emotion touches your spirit and your body.
The Laestrygonians and the Cyclopes,
savage Poseidon; you won't encounter them
unless you stow them away inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up before you.

Hope that the road is a long one.
Many may the summer mornings be
when - with what pleasure, with what joy -
you first put into harbors new to your eyes;
may you stop at Phoenician trading posts
and there acquire the finest wares:
mother-of-pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
and heady perfumes of every kind:
as many heady perfumes as you can.
Many Egyptian cities may you visit
that you may learn, and go on learning, from their sages.

Always in your mind keep Ithaca.
To arrive there is your destiny.
But do not hurry your trip in any way.
Better that it may last for many years;
that you drop anchor at the island an old man,
rich with all you've gotten on the way,
not expecting Ithaca to make you rich.

Ithaca gave you the beautiful journey;
without her you wouldn't have set upon the road.
But now she has nothing left to give you.

And if you find her poor, Ithaca didn't deceive you.
As wise as you will have become, with so much experience,
you will understand, by then, these Ithacas; what they mean.