Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, PINDAR AND CORINNA; FOR CHARLES L. O'DONNELL, C.S.C., by THOMAS WALSH


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

PINDAR AND CORINNA; FOR CHARLES L. O'DONNELL, C.S.C., by                    
First Line: Corinna, hail the victress! Evoae!'
Last Line: Ethereal touched his soul awake with smiles.
Alternate Author Name(s): Gill, Roderick; Strange, Garrett
Subject(s): Forgetfulness; Greece; Love - Loss Of; Man-woman Relationships; Praise; Greeks; Male-female Relations


"CORINNA, Hail the Victress! Evoae!"
The call of feasting down from Tánagra.—
"Corinna! Evoae!"—by twilight hills
And river and the fume of altar flames,
With the great call of music, where glad youths
Twining like garlands, on their rhythmic steps,
Bear her, new-crowned, along the shouting walls
And out between the vineyards to her home.
Five times the victor's crown had pressed those brows
Whose beauty sculptured into marble shone
Already in the Muses' shrines;—five times
Had she, breasting her lyre beneath the gold
Of hair unfilleted, struck forth her songs
Of home, of love, of old familiar names—
Dreams such as humble-hearted mothers know,
Echoes of little lanes and woodside shrines.
Then the vast festal throngs reached forth to her
Lovingly, gladly, and for memory's sake
Forgot the mighty singing and the art
Of oldtime Greece, forgot the rules, forgot
Their glorious past, in joyance of their home.
And now a dark indignant figure paced
The shadows towards Thebes; alone he went
High Pindar, who had lost—he Lord of Song—
The prize to her a woman of the hills.
Black rage was in his heart with scorn of men
And all the littleness of life; half-blind
He strode along the rocky steeps and out
Against the threshold of the starry skies.
There night crept down to welcome him; the breeze
Chill from the outer seas would cool his brows;
The stars swung round him till he raised his head
Lone as some mountain peak beneath its snows,
And hatred died and scorn upon his lips
Melted to an adoring prayer, as calm
Ethereal touched his soul awake with smiles.





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