( Things Done )
How does a Poet become
An upholder of the Moral Arc of the Universe
Tending towards goodness?
By recording history , things that happen
In the outer world and in the world within
The world of the mind : ideas, reason
The world of the imagination : images , myths
The world of the soul : faith and hope
Seeing the great lawgiver Solon
trying to copy his nephew
who was singing a song by Sappho
Someone asked him :
“Why , Solon ,
should you waste your time on it?”
Solon replied,
“So that I may learn it before I die.”
Ammianus Marcellinus,
He who professed to have been
“a former soldier and a Greek”
(miles quondam et graecus),
In his Res Gestae
(Rerum gestarum Libri XXXI)
in thirty-one volumes
recording the history and traditions of his time
in Rome in the Fourth Century before Christ
speaks of Socrates labouring day and night
at reading and debating ,
and when asked why , saying simply this :
“in order to leave life knowing a little more”
( “ut aliquid sciens amplius e vita discedam” )
Knowledge and Imagination
Weaving tales , narratives, songs
enter our genes
help us evolve
Makaris!
Take heart .
Makers of Poetry !
No poem is futile
( Inspired by a reading of Lempriere’s Classical Dictionary )
( ASA)