Day 19 - "Pallas Athene"

Good afternoon, all ye blog-absorbers of the world.

It's a blisteringly hot 94-degree day outside and now that I've watered my garden and gone back inside for some mild relief from the heat, I thought maybe it would be an appropriate time to post a new poem for the day.

In other news, however, the book itself is really coming along. Only about 10 more pages to go and I'm going to start formatting it for Ebook standards which should only take oh about a century or so, considering I'm pretty rusty on my html skills - they were at their height my senior year of high school. Since then, I don't think I've written over one or two pages of html code in total. That's pretty sad. Well, perhaps not - I've since made up for it with other interesting life skills, I'd like to think, and have spent much less time in front of a computer screen. :)

Anyway, back to the poem for today: It's one I'd had on the backburner for a while in my mind, and when an opportunity finally presented itself while reading a book of Greek myths I seized on it and let the two moments collide in Pallas Athene - the goddess Athena's 'extra' name.

The conversation between the children in the poem is one of my favorite little trinkets of life I've picked up over the last few years. The lines are almost taken verbatim from a conversation I overheard on a New York subway train a few years back between a couple of 4-6 year olds. It was so priceless - so perfect - I could never forget it. And then when I came upon the story of the relationship between the goddess Athena and her mortal friend Pallas, I finally knew I'd found the perfect fit to bring the pregnant meaning in those words to life in poetic form.

There are many things we must come to grips with in our time on this earth and some of us, it seems, are almost obsessed with the "awful black spears" of this life. Somehow, I believe, it is our duty to shun these things - to shun them proudly and live as if they shall never pierce us. To exist and enjoy the happiness in every moment, and to find in ourselves not an ignorance of those facts, but a full and cheerful embracement of them, as if to say to death itself: "You're quick... but you'll have to be quicker to catch someone like me when it's time."

This we must do, if we do not wish to forever carry Pallas's skin upon each of our aegises to remind us of our careless sins. It's something I still struggle with, but this poem always comes back to remind me in the end.

And without further ado... enjoy the poem! And if you have the means, read up on some Greek mythology in your spare time. It truly captures the imagination, in so many ways.


"Pallas Athene"


A very young girl, named Athene, said to her friend,
“We are all of us going to die someday.”
And the other young girl, named Pallas, replied,
“No we are not, that’s a lie.”
And the first spoke again, saying,
“I was told by my father,
And he said that we are all of us going to die,
And that we are all of us going to die just the same
No matter what -
Even if we don’t do anything wrong.”
And the young girl named Pallas looked askance,
And then down,
And said to her friend,
“I don’t want to play with you anymore.”

And, after many long years, the girl named Pallas did die,
And old Athene bent down
And took up her name
To honor her end.

And never, ‘til then,
Was she filled with such contempt
For the ways of this world;
For the mortal delight
In carelessly revealing
The foolhardy knowledge
Of its awful, black spear.


- Joshua Clarke