Saturday, December 23, 2017
Keeping in Touch
Greek Anthology 9.401 (by Palladas; tr. Tony Harrison):
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Loving the rituals that keep men close,The Greek:
Nature created means for friends apart:
pen, paper, ink, the alphabet,
signs for the distant and disconsolate heart.
Ἡ φύσις ἐξεῦρεν, φιλίης θεσμοὺς ἀγαπῶσα,W.R. Paton's translation:
τῶν ἀποδημούντων ὄργανα συντυχίης,
τὸν κάλαμον, χάρτην, τὸ μέλαν, τὰ χαράγματα χειρός,
σύμβολα τῆς ψυχῆς τηλόθεν ἀχνυμένης.
Nature, loving the duties of friendship, invented instruments by which absent friends can converse, pens, paper, ink, handwriting, tokens of the heart that mourns afar off.
