Kaisarion

Partly to verify the facts of a certain period,
partly to kill an hour or two,
last night I picked up and read
a volume of inscriptions about the Ptolemies.
The lavish praise and flattery are much the same
for each of them. All are brilliant,
glorious, mighty, benevolent;
everything they undertake is full of wisdom.
As for the women of their line, the Berenices and Cleopatras,
they too, all of them, are marvellous.

When I'd found the facts I wanted
I would have put the book away, but a brief
insignificant mention of King Kaisarion
suddenly caught my eye...

There you stood with your indefinable charm.
Because so little
is known about you from history,
I could fashion you more freely in my mind.
I made you good-looking and sensitive.
My art gives your face
a dreamy, appealing beauty.
And so completely did I imagine you
that late last night,
as my lamp went out -I let it go out on purpose-
I thought you came into my room,
it seemed you stood there in front of me, looking just as you
would have
in conquered Alexandria,
pale and weary, ideal in your grief,
still hoping they might take pity on you,
the scum who whispered: "Too much Caesars."

Constantine P. Cavafy

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