I can just read the inscription on this ancient stone.
“Lo[r]d Jesus Christ.” I make out a “So[u]l.”
“In the mon[th] of Athyr” “Lefkio[s] went to sleep.”
Where his age is mentioned—“lived to the age of”—
the Kappa Zeta shows that he went to sleep a young man.
In the corroded part I see “Hi[m]... Alexandrian.”
Then there are three badly mutilated lines—
though I can pick out a few words, like “our tea[r]s,” “grief,”
then “tears” again, and “sorrow to [us] his [f]riends.”
I think Lefkios must have been greatly loved.
In the month of Athyr Lefkios went to sleep.
Reprinted from C.P. CAVAFY: Collected Poems Revised Edition, translated by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard, edited by George Savidis. Translation copyright © 1975, 1992 by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard. Princeton University Press. For reuse of these translations, please contact Princeton University Press.
The Canon