Classic Poem

Die Sonnenlichter spielten

The sun's gay lights were playing
Over the wide and rolling sea.
Far off, and anchored, I saw the ship
That was to take me home;
But the right wind was lacking
And I was still sitting on a white sand-dune
Upon the beach.
And I read the song of Odysseus,
That old and ever-youthful song
From whose leaves, with the breath of the ocean rushing through them,
Rises joyfully,
The breath of the gods,
And the radiant Springtime of man,
And the blue, smiling heaven of Hellas.

My noble heart was loyal, and accompanied
The son of Laertes through terror and travail;
Sat down with him, suffered and wept with him
At friendly hearths
Where queens regaled him, spinning purple cloths.
It helped him with his lies, and aided his escape
From giants' caverns and the arms of sirens.
It followed him down the Cimmerian night,
Through storm and shipwreck —
It stood with him through struggles past all telling.
And then I sighed, " Oh harsh Poseidon,
Thy anger is fearful;
And I myself am afraid
Of my own home-coming. "

Scarcely had I spoken,
When the sea was churned into foam
And out of the whitening waters rose
The head of the sea-god,
Sea-weed crowned,
And scornfully he called:

" Have no fear, little poet!
I haven't the least intention to harm
Your poor little boat,
Nor frighten your precious little soul
With a lusty, long-to-be-remembered rocking.
For you, bardlet, have never vexed me.
You have never, that I know of, shaken the smallest turret
Of Priam's holy city.
Nor have you singed a single hair
From the eyelash of my son, Polyphemus;
And, surely, never have you been befriended or counseled
By Pallas Athene, the goddess of Wisdom! "

Thus cried Poseidon
And dived back in the sea.
And at the coarse old sailor's joke
I heard Amphitrite, the fat old fish-wife,
And the stupid daughters of Nereus,
Laughing under the waters.