Constantine P. Cavafy

29 April 1863 – 29 April 1933 / Alexandria

That's The Man

Unknown -a stranger in Antioch- the man from Edessa
writes and writes. And at last, there,
the final canto's done. That makes

eighty-three poems in all. But so much writing,
so much versifying, the intense strain
of phrasing in Greek, has worn the poet out,
and now everything has gone stale.

But a thought suddenly brings him out of his dejection:
the sublime 'That's the man'
which Lucian once heard in his sleep.
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