Song for Telemachus

DARK Ithaca rises from the waters of the sunlit midday sea, and in the silence of the sun stands the palace of Ulysses.

Over the crags and the rising roofs is the tower where Penelope sits alone until darkness dims the line of the horizon : till darkness covers the trees in the courtyard and the hills where the sheep are feeding . . . .

Bitter is it for him who meditates on wrong, bitter is it to be filled with desire of revenge.

-Ask not gaiety of Telemachus,

seek him not in the hall where the torches are lit, where to the sound of the harps the dancers, for the pleasure of the suitors, the young aspirants, in slow patterns move.

Oh stern Telemachus, - -

,was it happy -to be the son of Ulysses, the guide of his people, the wise Ulysses ?

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Far is he from you and his people 'far is he from the centre of his heart.

It is ever -so with the wise men, the councillors,

in the land of marvel they are loit, with the 'spirits of the sea and the sky they are alone.

Oh Telemachus, bitter are your days,

The fame of your father has brought many strangers to the door— Sea are lost among the faces of the strangers.

My song for Telernachut

.is harsh as sea salt,

mournful as the deep cleft valleys of the mountains.

EDWARD Asnomyr.