Homer And Laertes
Laertes: Gods help thee! and restore to thee thy sight!
My good old guest, I am more old than thou,
Yet have outlived by many years my son
Odysseus and the chaste Penelope.
Homer: Hither I come to visit thee and sing
His wanderings and his wisdom, tho my voice
Be not the voice it was.
Laertes: First let us taste
My old sound wine, and break my bread less old,
But old enough for teeth like thine and mine.
Homer: So be it! I sing best when such good cheer
Refreshes me, and such a friend as thou.
Laertes: Far hast thou wandered since we met, and told
Strange stories. Wert thou not afraid some God
Or Goddess should have siez'd upon thy ear
For talking what thou toldest of their pranks.
Homer: They often came about me while I slept
And brought me dreams, none painful, none profane;
They loved thy son, and for his sake loved me.
Laertes: Apollo, I well know, was much thy friend.
Homer: He did not treat me quite as Marsyas
Was treated by him: lest he should, I sang
His praise in my best chaunt: for Gods love praise.
Laertes: Have they enricht thee? for I see thy cloak is ragged.
Homer: Ragged cloak is poet's garb.
Laertes: I have two better; one of them for thee.
Penelope, who died five years ago,
Spun it; her husband wore it only once
And but one year, the anniversary
Of their espousal.
Homer: Wear it will I not,
But I will hang it on the brightest nail
Of the first temple where Apollo sits,
Golden-hair'd, in his glory.
Laertes: So thou shalt
If so it please thee: yet we first will quaff
The gift of Bakkos, for methinks his gifts
Are quite as welcome to the sons of song
[...] Read more
poem by Walter Savage Landor
Added by Poetry Lover
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