And man's skills cannot be told,
One outranks them all: the mind
Discretion moves to what's at hand.
----------
Yet resilient Theseus
Did not flinch:
Poising tall
On the planked deck,
He dived an arc
To his welcome warm
In the sea's glades.
Minos, bit to the quick . . . .
----------
Works of the gods are wonders
Seaworthy men confirm.
----------
This for the last time:
Profit can crush
Profoundest minds.
----------
One writer picks another's brains--
Call it tradition:
Taking the gates of a new song
Is no small job.
----------
One criterion, one approach
Leads on to man's success:
The soul that sees out
Life in self-delight.
Who hounds his wits
At the heels of crowding cares
And pummels his mind with what's to come,
Drives dead work through the days and nights . . . .
Throttle your heart with sorrow,
All the gladness dies.
----------
. . . when she curves that smooth arm,
And flicks some wine at the saucers--
Just with a neat turn of her wrist--
Our flute-girl serves her bachelors.
----------
Never underhand,
The words that Wisdom
Resonates in man.
----------
The gifts of the Muses,
Goals of a hard campaign,
Do not surrender
To all who handle arms.
----------
*Bacchylides was a Greek poet of the fifth century B.C. You can find these fragments and more with an appropriate scholarly treatment in . . .
Bacchylides, Complete Poems,
Translated, with a Note to the New Edition, by Robert Fagles,
With a Foreward by Sir Maurice Bowra,
Introduction and Notes by Adam M. Parry,
Yale University Press: New Haven & London,
1998.
(The red is from kelp-wrappings before I put the piece into the pit, I'm fairly sure.)
