felt his death was near.
The court astrologers -paid, of course- kept on insisting
that he still had many years to live.
But while they were having their say,
he remembered an old religious custom
and ordered ecclesiastical vestments
to be brought from a monastery,
and he put them on, glad to appear
modestly dressed like a priest or monk.
Happy all those who believe,
and like Emperor Manuel end their lives
dressed modestly in their faith.
and where he’s waiting out the two or three months ahead,another two or three months until business falls offso he can leave for the city and plunge headlonginto its action, its entertainment;in the boring village where he’s waiting out the time—he goes to bed tonight full of sexual longing,all his youth on fire with the…
});
a thing like that: Ptolemy’s demand,to guarantee their treaty, that she too go to Egyptand be held there as a hostage-a very humiliating, indecorous thing.And he would be about to speak yet always hesitate,would start to tell her yet always stop.But the magnificent woman understood him(she’d already heard some rumours about it)and she encouraged him…
I condemned’. He thought we’d be devastatedby that ‘condemned’, the silly ass.Witticisms like that don’t get by with us Christians.Our quick reply: ‘You read but didn’t understand;had you understood, you wouldn’t have condemned.’
