A Gift From Prometheus To Mankind
In Greek Mythology there are many legends,
written about the cruelty, vindictiveness of the gods.
Zeus and the other gods in their petty jealousy,
rivalry often punished, sacrificed men like pawns.
Before the rule of Olympian Gods other Gods ruled.
These were the powerful Titans, the mighty elder gods.
Prometheus was the noblest of the sons of Uranus and Gaia.
Titans all three! Prometheus an arch-rebel and friend to man!
Prometheus belonged to the powerful race of Titans!
The powerful Titans, were cousins to the Olympian Gods,
whose constant hostility to man, Prometheus opposed!
Prometheus gave the wondrous gift of fire to man!
Hearing of this, in a rage Zeus, ordered Prometheus,
seized punished imprisoned; bound by steel chains!
Prometheus was bound to a rock!
On a mountain peak, in the Caucasus,
mountains at the edge of a stream!
Near an Ocean in a place where it snows perpetually!
Where the wind ever howls ceaselessly,
because he had given a gift, mighty fire to mortal man!
Prometheus was sentenced to spend eternity!
Suffering miserably chained to a rocky crag,
with two vultures hovering, near tormenting him!
These two vultures cruelly feasted upon man’s!
Titan friend Prometheus! Tearing at,
his meal exposed belly; eating his living liver!
The ancient Greeks had another version of this,
cruel torture, in which an eagle, the offspring of;
Echidan and Typhon, eats his flesh encased liver!
The great terror of this raw tragedy, is that immediately
after, the eagle eats, consumes Prometheus’
liver; his liver would continually renew itself overnight!
Zeus would always cruelty vindictively!
Send this eagle every day!
To gnaw at, poor prisoner Prometheus’
liver, which is eaten in agony!
But would grow whole again!
Every night because Prometheus!
Being a Titan was immortal!
This story is amazing but merely a myth!
A true story about a real
all powerful God a real immortal,
is a miracle, proving our
Creator’s, love for his humanity!
poem by Terence George Craddock
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Related quotes
Ballade: Legacy
Within a stalk of fennel hid,
Prometheus took fire for
some poor ancestral hominid,
infuriating Zeus in lore.
Our forbears lived by nature's law
and myth to truth is paradox,
yet when they cooked their food from raw,
they travelled paths unorthodox.
Zeus fashioned clay in counterbid,
first woman, cursed with moral flaw.
Pandora batted sweet eyelid,
Prometheus refused, wherefore
Zeus chained him, while an eagle tore
his liver flayed upon the rocks.
When Titan sought mankind's rapport,
he travelled paths unorthodox.
Zeus gave a jar and then forbid,
Pandora look into it's maw.
Of course, she peeked inside the lid
and helpless, watched the ills outpour.
Does hope remain for us in store?
the vessel, be it jar or box.
When prying led her to explore,
she travelled paths unorthodox.
Shall we live happy evermore?
our bodies shaped by boon and pox.
Will future beings add encore?
They travelled paths unorthodox.
poem by Diane Hine
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Sonnet XIV: If He From Heav'n
If he from Heav'n that filch'd that living fire
Condemn'd by Jove to endless torment be,
I greatly marvel how you still go free
That far beyond Prometheus did aspire.
The fire he stole, although of heav'nly kind,
Which from above he craftily did take,
Of lifeless clods us living men to make,
He did bestow in temper of the mind;
But you broke into Heav'n's immortal store,
Where Virtue, Honor, Wit, and Beauty lay,
Which taking thence you have escap'd away,
Yet stand as free as e'er you did before;
Yet old Prometheus punish'd for his rape.
Thus poor thieves suffer when the greater 'scape.
poem by Michael Drayton
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Prometheus
Prometheus stole from Heaven the sacred fire
And swept to earth with it o'er land and sea.
He lit the vestal flames of poesy,
Content, for this, to brave celestial ire.
Wroth were the gods, and with eternal hate
Pursued the fearless one who ravished Heaven
That earth might hold in fee the perfect leaven
To lift men's souls above their low estate.
But judge you now, when poets wield the pen,
Think you not well the wrong has been repaired?
'Twas all in vain that ill Prometheus fared:
The fire has been returned to Heaven again!
We have no singers like the ones whose note
Gave challenge to the noblest warbler's song.
We have no voice so mellow, sweet, and strong
As that which broke from Shelley's golden throat.
The measure of our songs is our desires:
We tinkle where old poets used to storm.
We lack their substance tho' we keep their form:
We strum our banjo-strings and call them lyres.
poem by Paul Laurence Dunbar
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The Return to Nature.
(I) PROMETHEUS 1-
IT was the south : mid-everything,
-
Mid-land, mid-summer, noon ;
-
And deep within a limpid spring
-
The mirrored sun of June.
-
Splendour in freshness ! Ah, who stole
-
This sun, this fire, from heaven?
-
He holds it shining in his soul,
-
Prometheus the forgiven.
(II) THETIS2-
In her bright title poets dare
-
What the wild eye of fancy sees --
-
Similitude -- the clear, the fair
-
Light mystery of images.
-
Round the blue sea I love the best
-
The argent foam played, slender, fleet ;
-
I saw -- past Wordsworth and the rest --
-
Her natural, Greek, and silver feet.
poem by Alice Meynell
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The Brethren
SLUMBER and Sleep, two brethren ordain'd by the gods to their service,
Were by Prometheus implored, comfort to give to his race;
But though so light to the gods, too heavy for man was their burden,
We in their slumber find sleep, we in their sleep meet with death.
poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The Titanic
Forth flashed the serpent streak of steel,
Consummate crown of man's device;
Down crashed upon an immobile
And brainless barrier of ice.
Courage!
The grey gods shoot a laughing lip: -
Let not faith founder with the ship!
We reel before the blows of fate;
Our stout souls stagger at the shock.
Oh! there is Something ultimate
Fixed faster than the living rock.
Courage!
Catastrophe beyond belief
Harden our hearts to fear and grief!
The gods upon the Titans shower
Their high intolerable scorn;
But no god knoweth in what hour
A new Prometheus may be born.
Courage!
Man to his doom goes driving down;
A crown of thorns is still a crown!
No power of nature shall withstand
At last the spirit of mankind:
It is not built upon the sand;
It is not wastrel to the wind.
Courage!
Disaster and destruction tend
To taller triumph in the end.
poem by Aleister Crowley
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Time as he grows old teaches all things.
Aeschylus in Prometheus Bound
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Words are the physicians of the mind diseased.
Aeschylus in Prometheus Bound
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Nightmares in the Dream Realm
I'm doing well with tales to tell
From not so distant lands
I've a soul to sell but don’t fancy hell
So I'll keep it in my hands.
Maybe I'll share a little but
Never with the devil that stirs
Nightmares in the dream realm,
Yet to keep you warm I would
Run the fires of hell, as Prometheus
Stealing fire from the Gods I would
Run, carrying the flames of the sun
To keep you warm from the cold.
But would you allow it or would
You strive into fire by your own accord?
poem by David Lacey
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Prometheus is reaching out for the stars with an empty grin on his face.
quote by Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Man is the animal who weeps and laughs – and writes. If the first Prometheus brought fire from heaven in a fennel-stalk, the last will take it back – in a book.
quote by John Cowper Powys
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Girl To A Soldier On leave
Girl To A Soldier On Leave
Love! You love me — your eyes
Have looked through death at mine.
You have tempted a grave too much
I let you — I repine.
I love you - Titan lover,
My own storm-days Titan.
Greater than the son of Zeus,
I know whom I would choose.
Titan — my splendid rebel —
The old Prometheus
Wanes like a ghost before your power —
His pangs were joys to yours.
Pallid days arid and wan
Tied your soul fast.
Babel-cities smoky tops
Pressed upon your growth
Weary gyves. What were you
But a word in the brains ways,
Or the sleep of Circes swine.
One gyve holds you yet.
It held you hiddenly on the Somme
Tied from my heart at home.
O must it loosen now? — I wish
You were bound with the old gyves.
Love! you love me — your eyes
Have looked through death at mine.
You have tempted a grave too much.
I let you - I repine.
poem by Isaac Rosenberg
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The Showers Pouring
Pure torture shackled Prometheus
In front of the television in the middle-
Of South Florida:
The carpet red, the curtains velvet,
The air-conditioning expensive blowing.
The brochures said for a short holiday,
But the ants have already found the cracks
And trail of breadcrumbs, so along his
Grayish shanks they are crawling;
He quivers trying to remain politely
Knowing there are gods about, though maybe
They’ve all gone down the street where
He can hear the lions roaring, and there
Was just a car-accident, and the ambulance is
Coming, and right now the studio audience
Is laughing, and above him like so many
Hindu gods, the ceiling fans are pirouetting;
And Cupid and Psyche are chewing bubble-gum
Over by the piano, playing awful romancing.
The cat is purring, and the dog is snoring,
And coming later that same afternoon
The showers pouring.
poem by Bret R. Crabrooke
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Don't Sympathize
Why I detest sympathy
It revives hurtful memories
Those days that are sad,
Let them go with my past.
Don't remind me of my misery
They are now my history
Those friends I have hurt
I am human, I was only wrong
Even Olympus knew no love
Zeus lived in sexual lust
Hera was too jealous
Prometheus should rule Olympus
Zeus should be chained
For goodness sake, let him wail
Tiresias should not be so blinded
Oedipus shouldn't have left
Lius should have abdicated
And his throne coveted,
The Sphinx shouldn't have
had a riddle
She should be a pawn in our fiddle.
These are histories
They shouldn't conflict with
our mysteries
They should be buried in
the tomb of Herodotus.
And today, I am glad we have a God
Who's world itself is love;
And we all know He's perfect in all.
In my life I had never been an epigone
But great men have inspired me
To them I will forever be grateful
And to my God, I'll be faithful.
poem by Efe Benjamin
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Nor need we be surprised that men so often embrace almost any doctrines, if they are proclaimed with a voice of absolute assurance.
Learned Hand in address "A Fanfare for Prometheus", January 29, 1955
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Complaint Of Prometheus
PROMETHEUS (alone)
O holy Aether, and swift-winged Winds,
And River-wells, and laughter innumerous
Of yon Sea-waves! Earth, mother of us all,
And all-viewing cyclic Sun, I cry on you,--
Behold me a god, what I endure from gods!
Behold, with throe on throe,
How, wasted by this woe,
I wrestle down the myriad years of Time!
Behold, how fast around me
The new King of the happy ones sublime
Has flung the chain he forged, has shamed and bound me!
Woe, woe! to-day's woe and the coming morrow's
I cover with one groan. And where is found me
A limit to these sorrows?
And yet what word do I say? I have foreknown
Clearly all things that should be; nothing done
Comes sudden to my soul--and I must bear
What is ordained with patience, being aware
Necessity doth front the universe
With an invincible gesture. Yet this curse
Which strikes me now, I find it hard to brave
In silence or in speech. Because I gave
Honor to mortals, I have yoked my soul
To this compelling fate. Because I stole
The secret fount of fire, whose bubbles went
Over the ferrule's brim, and manward sent
Art's mighty means and perfect rudiment,
That sin I expiate in this agony,
Hung here in fetters, 'neath the blanching sky.
Ah, ah me! what a sound,
What a fragrance sweeps up from a pinion unseen
Of a god, or a mortal, or nature between,
Sweeping up to this rock where the earth has her bound,
To have sight of my pangs, or some guerdon obtain--
Lo, a god in the anguish, a god in the chain!
The god Zeus hateth sore,
And his gods hate again,
As many as tread on his glorified floor,
Because I loved mortals too much evermore.
Alas me! what a murmur and motion I hear,
As of birds flying near!
And the air undersings
The light stroke of their wings--
And all life that approaches I wait for in fear.
Epigram : On The Inventor Of Gunpowder (Translated From Milton)
Praise in old time the sage Prometheus won,
Who stole ethereal radiance from the sun;
But greater he, whose bold invention strove
To emulate the fiery bolts of Jove.
poem by William Cowper
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The Origin of Trades
When with a skilful hand Prometheus made
A statue that the human form displayed,
Pandora, his own work, to wed he chose,
And from those two the human race arose.
When first to know herself the fair began,
She played her smile's enchantment upon man;
By softness and alluring speech she gained
The ascendant, and her master soon enchained;
Her beauty on Prometheus' sense ne'er palled,
And the first husband was the first enthralled.
The god of war soon saw the new-formed fair;
His manly beauty and his martial air,
His golden casque and all his glittering arms
Pandora pleased, and he enjoyed her charms.
When the sea's ruler in his humid court
Had heard of this intrigue from fame's report,
The fair he sought, a like reception found,
Could Neptune fail where Mars a triumph found?
Day's light-haired god from his resplendent height
Their pleasures saw, and hoped the same delight;
She could not to refuse him have the heart,
Who o'er the day presides and every art.
Mercury with eloquence declared his flame,
And in his turn he triumphed o'er the dame.
Squalid and sooty from his forge, at first
Vulcan was ill-received, and gave disgust;
But he by importunity obtained
What other gods with so much ease had gained.
Pandora's prime thus winged with pleasure flew,
Then she in languor lived, nor wherefore knew.
She that devotes to love her life's first spring,
As years increase can do no other thing;
For e'en to gods inconstancy is known,
And those who dwell in heaven to change are prone.
Pandora of her favors had been free
To gods who left her; happening then to see
A satyr who through plains and meadows strayed,
Smit with his mien, she love-advances made.
To these amours our race existence owes,
From such amusements all mankind arose;
Hence those varieties in talents spring,
In genius, passions, business, everything:
To Vulcan one, to Mars one owes his birth,
This to a satyr; very few on earth
Claim any kindred with the god of day,
Few that celestial origin display.
From parents each his taste and turn derives:
But most of all trades now Pandora's thrives;
The most delightful, though least rare it seems,
And is the trade all Paris most esteems.
I Want To Go Over There
i want to go over there
i now have the courage
of hercules
i now have the wisdom
of prometheus
i want to cross this river
take me
on this sail
silently, gently, gracefully
take me
to the other side
where there is no pain
anymore
where the songs of praise
are sung
i want to go over there
now and
forever
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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The Two Faces of January
Kirsten Dunst, Viggo Mortensen, Oscar Isaac, David Warshofsky, Daisy Bevan, Yigit Ozsener, Prometheus Aleifer, Socrates Alafouzos
by Hossein Amini from The Two Faces of January (2014)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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