![In the brightness of noon – Collection Pavlos Kalogeraki, Chios](https://www.varrias.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/6-In-the-brightness-of-noon-666x321.jpg)
When They Come Alive
Try to keep them, poet,
those erotic visions of yours,
however few of them there are that can be stilled.
Put them, half-hidden, in your lines.
Try to hold them, poet,
when they come alive in your mind
at night or in the brightness of noon.
Constantine Cavafis
Translated by Edmund Keeley/Philip Sherrard