Their illicit pleasure has been fulfilled. They get up and dress quickly, without a word. They come out of the house separately, furtively; and as they move along the street a bit unsettled, it seems they sense that something about them betrays what kind of bed they’ve just been lying on. But what profit for the life of the artist: tomorrow, the day after, or years later, he’ll give voice to the strong lines that had their beginning here.
Reprinted from C.P. CAVAFY: Collected Poems Revised Edition, translated by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard, edited by George Savidis. Translation copyright © 1975, 1992 by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard. Princeton University Press. For reuse of these translations, please contact Princeton University Press.
The Canon