Laudator Temporis Acti

This post is by Eric Thomson.

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The following rather Neoplatonic poem by a 27 year-old E.R. Dodds was published in the London literary magazine, Coterie (December 1919, issue 3, pp. 10-11):

The Moon-Worshippers

We are the partly real ones
Whose bodies are an accident,
Whose phantasies were never meant
To fix their unsubstantial thrones
Inside a house of blood and bones.

All day we creep about the brain,
Benumbed and deafened with the noise
Of carnal pains and carnal joys,
That thrust their stupid joy and pain
Across the peace of our disdain.

But when the grosser senses swoon,
Then with dances privily
And the wordless litany
A million ghosts will importune
Our vestal mistress, Lady Moon:

"O undefiled, O lucid Moon!
Hear our attenuated cry!
O little fish of the cold sky,
O swimmer of the void lagoon,
O Moon, shall our release be soon?"

Within two months the poem had been translated into Spanish and appeared in the Seville literary magazine Grecia, (Year 3, No. 40, February 20th 1920):

Adoradores de la Luna

Somos aquellos que la plena
realidad no alcanzaron,
y cuya carne es algo secundario,
y cuyas ideaciones no se crearon
para erigir sus tronos irreales
en una casa de esqueleto y sangre.

Por el cerebro errantes todo el día,
nos aturde la orgía
de penas y delicios de la carne
que hieren con sus risas y su llanto
el trémulo desdén de nuestro encanto.

Empero,
al relajarse la carnal tortura, danzan velados
al son de raras cantinelas mudas
innúmeros espectros que importunan
la alta señora, la Vestal, la Luna:

Oh virginal, oh luminosa Luna!
ampara nuestros ruegos atenuados.
Oh pescadito del azul helado,
oh nadador de la estelar laguna,
vendrás a redimirnos pronto, Luna?

The translator was an unknown 20 year-old Argentinian, who was then living in Seville with his family as part of their European sojourn, Jorge Luis Borges.


Samuel Palmer, Shepherds Under a Full Moon