Sing, Kalliope of the beautiful voice – who better than You! – of the workings of the world, mercurial and unchanging.
Of five ages, flowing one after the other, a twirling spiral of five different metals - a serpentine chimera devouring and regurgitating itself without end.
Five races of men followed one another, each one different from those that came before. They did not leave behind much for their successors, much less those successors understood.
Gold. Silver. Copper. Bronze. Iron. Human lives grow steadily shorter, Gods inevitably further with every step taken, with each coil of the wheeling spiral.
Only the oldest of the Olympians remember anything definite about the golden age, though they seldom tell.
Ouranides Kronos ruled that time with His wife Rhea. The young Earth was generous, rich in fruits, grain and honey, and those who walked upon Her then saw little difference between deadly Thanatos and Hypnos with His wreath of white poppies.
But that fabled, glittering race dissolved into eternity, became kind daimones, and, of all the places in the world, only the Isles of the Blessed heavy cares, so charitably gifted to humanity by Pandora, avoid – but who can reach them anymore?
Still, the illusion is persistent. Simply extend your hand – you could almost touch that happy world.
Here it is - shining gold, the sun in its zenith. Mountaintops embraced by the heavens, truth that does not hide behind endless veils, a youthful world without cracks, full of habitual violence and blinding immaculate beauty.
Glory impervious to rust, the face of Helios not yet hidden behind clouds, lavish banquets enjoyed by both the Gods above and mortal kings with their retinues.
It is still easy to forget the finality of mankind's fate, so similar to that of an anthill one accidentally crushes in blind haste.
The fissure between earth and heaven is tiny for now, and it is still not impossible to meet Dike, the lady of justice.
Sweat comes because of heat rather than from exhaustion, and men have yet to realize that all peace reeks of inevitable war.
Not for long. That half-remembered bliss is all too fragile, and pitiless Ananke is ready to spin the wheel of time – quickly, quickly, one more turn closer to insanity. Change is the only constant, peace as ephemeral as autumn's delicate gold.
Picture a glistening apple inscribed "To the most beautiful". Doves, embroidered on a veil of deep blue. Mykene's lion, gorged on wine yet thirsting for blood. Horses of immortal breed, a singer's voice among reverent silence, a field of wheat awaiting harvest, a heavenly swan's embrace, and that wondrous egg, not yet split into two halves of sorrow and joy.