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I've been telling the classes
that my favorite poet is

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Cavafy, a Greek poet
and a modern Greek poet,

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and I've done two.

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He has a poem called "The
Gods Desert Anthony,"

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and I've done two
translations of it

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that I would like to read.

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"The Gods Desert Anthony."

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Actually, they're
not translations,

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they really very
much adaptations.

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I stand by my window
looking over this valley.

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There was a sad
music in the air.

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Oh, I should explain that there
was a prophecy that Anthony,

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when he would lose his
kingdom of Egypt and Cleopatra

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and be defeated, he would
hear a troupe of musicians

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pass at midnight in the
street below his window.

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I stand by my window
looking over the valley.

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There is a sad music in the air.

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For when the gods desert
you, they play a music

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that we feel as grief.

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Anthony heard it too one night
in Alexandria when he was King.

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And for Queen, he had
Cleopatra, that delicious woman

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as I had you dear one.

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What a city that
was to be King of.

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Then, he heard the music
of those rascally gods

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masquerading as a
band of minstrels.

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As those wise ones,
those friends foretold.

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And at that moment, did he weep?

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Did he rage at the
gods for depriving them

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of such a paradise?

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Yes, he wept, he raged, for
you do not give up such a life

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without tears and cursing.

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You do not act noble standing
on the hill outside the city,

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and wave goodbye to the
Alexandria you are losing.

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No, you tear your
clothes in mourning

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and go wailing through
the world alone.

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Alone forever perhaps, forever
probably, and never forgive,

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certainly never forget, for the
kingdom had become your soul.

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And without it now,
you are nothing.

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