The horses of Achilles

Field of asphodels, beside you
two horses neighed
as they went by at gallop.
Their backs gleamed like a wave;
they came up out of the sea,
tore over the desert sand,
necks straining high, towering,
white foam at the mouth, stallion strong.
In their eyes
lightning smoldered;
and, waves themselves, they plundged again
into the waves,
foam into the sea's foam,
and vanished. I recognized
those stallions: one of them
took on a human voice to prophesy.
The hero held the reins;
he spurred, hurling
his godlike youth forward...

Sacred stallions, fate
has kept you indestructible,
fixing on you pure black foreheads,
charm against the profane eye,
a large and pure talisman.

Angelos Sikelianos, Selected Poems, Edmund Keeley e Philip Sherrard (trad.), Denise Harvey, 1996