The Distance To Regio Is Too Long Poem by Joseph S. Josephides

Short and fat with a squeaking voice
the ambassador from Acragas gave a speech
and all people of Regio burst out laughing.

I tried to bring them to their senses:
‘He is Tellias, generous benefactor of the cities
of Gela, Imera, Thermes, Syracouse; *
he gave roof to our army, he saved Arete.’

No response. They fell on the floor loudly laughing.
However, Tellias answer to them with a smile:
‘I am not handsome, nor a polite person.
My city of Acragas has many other polite persons,
but it sends them only on a mission to polite cities’.

Then Empedocles* moved my lips to talk in his place:
‘Citizens, you eat as if you would die tomorrow,
you build villas as if you would live a thousand years.’

The distance to Regio is too long,
as the distance from laughing to Gela,
where Aeschylus, in his grave,
feels sorrow and hopes in time.


© JosephJosephides