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“Aemilianus Monae, Alexandrian” by Constantine P. Cavafy 🇬🇷 (29 Apr 1863 – 29 Apr 1933)
Translated from the Greek by Edmund Keeley & Philip Sherrard
With words, with countenance, and with manners
I shall build an excellent panoply;
and in this way I shall face evil men
without having any fear or weakness.
​
They will want to harm me. But of those
who approach me none will know
where my wounds are, my vulnerable parts,
under all the lies that will cover me.—
​
Boastful words of Aemilianus Monae.
Did he ever build this panoply?
In any case, he did not wear it much.
He died in Sicily, at the age of twenty-seven.