OdysseusPadraic Colum2019University of Nebraska–LincolnCenter for Alex Telesca's Fame306 AndrewsUniversity of Nebraska–LincolnLincoln, NE 68588-4100alextelesca@outlook.com2019
The Best Poems of 1924L.A.G. StrongPadraic ColumOctober 1923Small, Maynard & Company PublishersBostonAlex Telesca
Transcribed and encoded a poem
Odysseus
(In Memory of Arthur Griffith)You had the prose of logic and of scorn,And words to sledge an iron argument,And yet you could draw down the outland birdsTo perch beside the ravens of your thought-The dreams whereby a people challengesIts dooms, its bounds. In ungrown days we knewyou,In ungrown days we heard you, and we heardAmongst boys' voices and old men's voicesA man's full voice. The hillsides knew you too,The deep sea knew you, where you'd swim ofmornings,And we would call you by a kindly name.And by that name I'd speak to you, and say"You were the one who knewWhat sacred resistance is in menThat are almost broken; how, from resistance usedA strength is born, a stormy, bright-eyed strength,Like Homer's Iris, messenger of the gods,Coming before the ships the enemyHas fung the fire upon. Our own, our nativestrengthYou mustered up." But I will never say it,Walking beside you, or looking on you,With your strong brow, and chin was like a targe,And eyes that were so kindly of us all.And sorrow comes as on that August day,With our ship cleaving through the seas for home,And that news coming sparkling through the air,That you were dead, and that we'd never see youLooking upon the state that you had builded.The news that came was like that weight of watersPoured on our hopes! Our navies yet unbuilded,Our city left inglorious on its site,Our fields uncleared, and overOur ancient house the ancient curse of war!And could we pray, touching the island-homeland,Other than this: "Odysseus, you who laboredSo long upon the barren outer sea;Odysseus, Odysseus, you who madeThe plan that drove the wasters from the house,And bent the bow that none could bend but you:Be with us still:Your memory be the watcher in our house,Your memory be the flame upon our hills."Padraic Colum