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296
ΦΩΝΗ ΛΟΓΟΣ ΕΜΨΥΧΟΣ
AESOPS – ANDRONIKOS NOUKIOS: THE CICADA AND THE ANTS
IN THE WINTERTIME THE WHEAT CROP GOT WET. THE ANTS WERE DRYING IT WHILE THE CICADA
WAS FAMISHED AND STARVED, AND WAS ASKING FROM THE ANTS TO BE GIVEN SOMETHING TO
EAT. AND THEY RESPONDED: “WHY DID YOU NOT GATHER FOOD IN THE SUMMERTIME?” TO WHICH
THE CICADA ANSWERED: “I HAD NO CHANCE TO FOR I WAS SINGING AND FEASTING.” AND THE ANTS
LAUGHED AND SAID THIS: “IF IN THE SUMMERTIME YOU SANG AND FEASTED, NOW IN THE WINTER-
TIME, YOU CAN DANCE”.
TESTIMONY
you cicada
no longer exist
I come to find you
I look in the tamarisks
the sea is sighing with the wind
a plastic bag is hanging
from the branches
you cicada
no longer exist
Summer’s black eyes
close their eyelids
coming down the staircase
I float on the steps
my tread lightly curves them
and they oscillate
until
they return one by one
to their initial place-
as if one never did pass
the testimony is always partial
an incidental piece
a fragment:
a little fish
was caught in the net
out of the universal sea
ASTERIUS, COMMENTARII IN PSALMOS HOMILIAE 31). Homily 14.6
Paroimiastis (author of proverbs): You go toward the ant, idler,
and I say: Go toward the ant, brother, and follow its routes and
become wiser than it, just as the cicada restfully flying over the
fields and orchards, steals not the apple nor the walnut, nor
shakes down the olive tree, nor aggrieves the farmer but excels
in making do with the dew, becomes spectator of the things that
do not concern him... thus, brother, make your way through the
world as if through a field, without cost to anyone, without cast-
ing an aspersion, but making do with what god gave you, like the
cicada with the dew. Like a cicada upon a tree, may you be cruci-
fied in the world.
PALATINE ANTHOLOGY, 7, 213 [ARCHIAS]
Before, on the green branches of some bushy pine
or shady fir you used to sit, sonorous
cicada, striking your chest with your legs and making
a song sweeter to the shepherd than the lyre.
Now, devoured by the ants that roamed the path
in Hades’ embrace you are unexpectedly enveloped.
PAL Fwd: TETTIX 7 ATINE ANTHOLOGY, 7, 193 [SIMIAS (CRICK-
ET=GRASSHOPPER)]
I grabbed this one with my own hand
while promenading in the fair woods
hidden in the leaves of a pulsating grapevine,
so I can fit inside the enclosure of a cage
a pleasant song that doesn’t require a tongue
CICADA/GRASSHOPPER VOICE_ANT WRITING
JESPER SVENBRO: The poem is itself the tomb of the Cicada
(or of the Cricket) that is, of the voice that is murdered, as it is
recorded, i.e. restricted to written signs, to “lifeless letters”
(Le Tombeau de la cigale, 35)
VOICE
WORD
ANIMATE