Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen Poems

Green-muscled ocean
Idol of many arms like an octopus
Convulsive incorruptible chaos
Ordered tumult
...

Banished from sin and the sacred
Now they inhabit the humble intimacy
Of daily life. They are
The leaky faucet the late bus
...

Midday. A corner of the deserted beach.
The huge, deep, open sun on high
Has chased all the gods from the sky.
...

For her to have such a slender neck
For her wrists to bend like flower stems
For her eyes to be so clear and direct
Her back so straight
...

Sibyls inside adamantine caves,
Totally loveless and blind.
Feeding emptiness like a sacred fire
While shadow dissolves night and day
...

To the gods we attributed a dazzling existence
Consubstantial with the sea the clouds trees and light
In them the waves' glinting the foam's long white frieze
The woods' secret and soft green the wheat's tall gold
...

Our civilization is so out of kilter that
Thought has separated itself from the hand

Ulysses King of Ithaca carpentered his boat
And also boasted of his ability
To plough a straight furrow in the field
...

Multiplicity makes us drunk
Astonishment leads us on
With daring and desire and calculated skill
We've broken the limits -
...

Lord free us from the dangerous game of transparency
There are no corals or shells on the sea floor of our soul
Just a smothered dream
...

We will rise again beneath the walls of Knossos
And in Delphi the centre of the world
We will rise again in the harsh light of Crete
...