Classic Poem

He, the Cumæan, has the neck of a bull, but the face of an ox,——
no, the face of a manly but rather docile young Hellene,
the face of a man not too intuitive, not too sophisticated, not at all sensual.
Only his head is before me, and yet
I see him standing motionless, composed, for a rubdown with oil, and perchance a sprinkling with sand,
just before entering the palæstrian contest.
He is not restive under the law of professional continence,——
for only the hands of males, his attendants, ever touch his thighs,——
nor is he even aversely alert to the touch of his male attendants.
The fellow is chaste.
He is abstracted.
He is absorbed in dreams of the perfect body.
He believes in a girl from another town, and trusts her,
and therefore puts her out of mind;
and when, some day, he shall embrace her,
he will contract his mighty biceps only a little,
and will touch her perhaps twice, with his immaculate, spiritual lips.
He is ready for the Olympiad.

But he from Ialysos——
he is a sharp though likable fellow.
I know him better than I know the Cumæan.
He attracts.
He captivates.
His beauty is of itself and at once magnetic, aggressive, adventurous, irresistible——
bracing, warm, sustained, like a wind blowing all day from over a sunny sea.
More subtle than the fellow from Cumæ,
he is much quicker of glance, more sure, more comprehensive.
More charming of feature than the other,
he is much more sensuous, more emotional——
likewise of body.
Unlike the trunk of the Cumæan, disciplined, solid, with lines rising straight from the massive hips to the massive but rather narrow shoulders,——
the corporal cylinder of civilized might,——
the trunk of the Ialysian, trained, hard, tapers from the broad but graceful shoulders to the slender waist,——
the corporal cone of dynamic idealism.
The fellow is wily.
He is agile.
He is a lover, a wit, a gentleman, a pleasing liar.
He is ready for a night with the hetairai——
ready for a day with the runners of races——
ready for valorous death at Arginusæ.