IX SATURNIA – VULCANIA
(Crisis of October, 2017)
It was, of course, a Greek man
Who told the story, fiction or not
The good world poets of old times
How they went to London, in secret
Then sailed back again (to Lisbon)
Before anyone, anyone would know
And for how long they had wanted so
To see North America, the crisis of spirit
With nobody, no one ever knowing it
Who went under many guises and names
A sad well-dressed man with large eyes
Who spoke and moved slowly, another
One in various dis-guises or (un)masked
Constantine Cavafy and Fernando Pessoa
The wine god and all the rest(less)
New Amsterdam, New York
Who had been there, the navel
With the dancing, waltzing poet
Lorca in Nueva York (in 1929)
Our beloved poets and their cities
The one that would never sleep,
And the city of Light and Reason
Oh they would never meet there
And they would never see again
From the oldest to the late…..
Saturnia the wanderer in Greek
Weathered by time, this one-liner
Tickets to cross the Atlantic ocean
Their gay voyage on a steamship
Who forgave our debts
Without zero longitude (meridian)
How to navigate and measure the distance
Using old equipment, astrolabes and quadrants
Keeping the same course
Alexandria found again
The library and the lighthouse
”The city of wisdom and beauty,
Where monks rage on the streets”
Clement and Cyril, Athanasios against
Areios, not against Dionysos the Areiopagite
Roman or Hebrew,
It was, of course, a Greek man
Who told the story, fiction or not
The good world poets of old times
How they went to London, in secret
Then sailed back again (to Lisbon)
Before anyone, anyone would know
And for how long they had wanted so
To see North America, the crisis of spirit
With nobody, no one ever knowing it
Who went under many guises and names
A sad well-dressed man with large eyes
Who spoke and moved slowly, another
One in various dis-guises or (un)masked
Constantine Cavafy and Fernando Pessoa
The wine god and all the rest(less)
New Amsterdam, New York
Who had been there, the navel
With the dancing, waltzing poet
Lorca in Nueva York (in 1929)
Our beloved poets and their cities
The one that would never sleep,
And the city of Light and Reason
Oh they would never meet there
And they would never see again
From the oldest to the late…..
Saturnia the wanderer in Greek
Weathered by time, this one-liner
Tickets to cross the Atlantic ocean
Their gay voyage on a steamship
Collapsing Nueva York,
The fall of cities again
Seen from a Wall Street bench
Seen from a Wall Street bench
(Aus der Neuen Welt)
Where the broker dealt
Where the broker dealt
A blow of death to literature and dollar,
To all cents and papers, gold coins
If the world oikonomia (economy) is like then
Who forgave our debts
And loans, more trading
Something to aim
In the hand of Eucatastrophe
When depression is too great, and their place
No longer there, no exchange for the gifts
But we were not forced to keep them
No longer there, no exchange for the gifts
But we were not forced to keep them
Without zero longitude (meridian)
How to navigate and measure the distance
Using old equipment, astrolabes and quadrants
Keeping the same course
With the shadow of Jacob
And if its length changes,
And if its length changes,
Where is our location
”Oh scavengers to be wrecked in plastic”
Alexandria found again
The library and the lighthouse
”The city of wisdom and beauty,
Where monks rage on the streets”
Clement and Cyril, Athanasios against
Areios, not against Dionysos the Areiopagite
Roman or Hebrew,
Christian and Greek cult(ure)s
How little we’ve learned,
How little we’ve learned,
Have we learned so little
Their Jewish community was
The largest in Antique
Who were tolerant,
Where Euclid and Eratosthenes
Worked by the sea and desert, the waste lands
Worked by the sea and desert, the waste lands
”The High Priestess would be untouched”
Philo and Septuagint (all the versions)
And even Archimedes well in the circles
Lo, Saint John the Almsgiver, the Merciful
”Cry out from the depths of your soul,
And from the darkness of this earth”
Saint Anthony would be around, too
Having a meeting with Saint Paul the Hermit
”For God knows and God sees everything”
The raven brought two loaves that day
And even Archimedes well in the circles
Lo, Saint John the Almsgiver, the Merciful
”Cry out from the depths of your soul,
And from the darkness of this earth”
Saint Anthony would be around, too
Having a meeting with Saint Paul the Hermit
”For God knows and God sees everything”
The raven brought two loaves that day
On the Mayflower’s journey
From England to the ends of West
The Dutch pilgrims came to build
The first congregation on those shores
English Puritans and refugees from Holland
With their fleet remnant, they went across
The raging sea, no monks left raging
Lady Fortune, the wheel(s) and the Rudder
Altar and the choir, the ship of church
The evolution of this image created once
The hours and XXIV Elders, the man
Old Saturn, Old Sun and Old Moon
Whatever moving like the world clock
”To the forge of the smith of gods,
Oh this barren-fertile island of Lemnos”
And when the planets began to move,
So time began, in the Saturnian phase
And the journey will end on Vulcan(ia)
From England to the ends of West
The Dutch pilgrims came to build
The first congregation on those shores
English Puritans and refugees from Holland
With their fleet remnant, they went across
The raging sea, no monks left raging
Lady Fortune, the wheel(s) and the Rudder
Altar and the choir, the ship of church
The evolution of this image created once
The hours and XXIV Elders, the man
Old Saturn, Old Sun and Old Moon
Whatever moving like the world clock
”To the forge of the smith of gods,
Oh this barren-fertile island of Lemnos”
And when the planets began to move,
So time began, in the Saturnian phase
And the journey will end on Vulcan(ia)
You said:
”I’ll go to another country, go to another shore.
Find another city better than this one.
Whatever I try to do is fated to turn out wrong
And my heart lies buried as though it were
”I’ll go to another country, go to another shore.
Find another city better than this one.
Whatever I try to do is fated to turn out wrong
And my heart lies buried as though it were
Something dead. How long can I let my mind
Moulder in this place? Wherever I turn,
Wherever I happen to look, I see the black
Ruins of my life, here, where I’ve spent
So many years, wasted them,
Destroyed them totally.”
You won’t find a new country,
You won’t find a new country,
Won’t find another shore.
This city will always pursue you.
This city will always pursue you.
You will walk the same streets,
Grow old in the same neighborhoods,
Will turn gray in these same houses.
You will always end up in this city.
Don’t hope for things elsewhere:
There is no ship for you, there is no road.
As you’ve wasted your life here,
Grow old in the same neighborhoods,
Will turn gray in these same houses.
You will always end up in this city.
Don’t hope for things elsewhere:
There is no ship for you, there is no road.
As you’ve wasted your life here,
In this small corner, you’ve destroyed it
Everywhere else in the world.
-Constantine Cavafy / The City
(English translation by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard)
-Constantine Cavafy / The City
(English translation by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard)