Our Diminished Company

by Brett Rutherford

     Adapted from Diogenes Laertius, The Greek Anthology, vii, 104, 105, 111, 112, 116

If drinkers and reprobates seem
fewer among us, if taverns
seem quieter, there is a cause.
Archiselaus, for one,
drank so much wine
he lost his senses. How
can one serve the Muse,
mouth open, words
rising invisible
to empty air, to die
with no last words?
Gone just like that!

Lycades, too,
fell down in a stupor.
Out of the wine keg
Bacchus reached forth
and dragged him down,
toes first, to Hades.
Strato's gone, too. The son
of pudgy Lampsacus
was the thinnest man ever
to lift a wine-cup.
So thin he grew,
that when some grim
and wasting fever came,
he never felt it.
One moment here,
next moment gone.

Remember Lyco, so
crippled by gout
he had to arrive
on a litter
his slaves carried,
ever so much
like a pig on a platter?
He died mid-feast,
and he who came
on others' feet,
ran on his own
to cold Hades.

Diogenes we lost.
No one knew where.
We lit a lamp.
The ground we beat
with gong and staff.
We drank and sang:
"Diogenes! Where?" —
The answer came
from below below:
"Alas, in Hades now." —
"Wherefore and why?" —
"My shame! For nothing!
I fell down drunk.
One fierce dog's bite
quite finished me.
Good bye to all!"

If in water, a little wine,
no harm, and more the morrow.
But if your drink is watered not,
such fools as these, you join in sorrow.