C.P. Cavafy
( The Collected Poems by C.P. Cavafy, translated by Evangelos Sachperoglou )
– What are we waiting for, assembled in the Forum?
The barbarians are to arrive today.
– Why then such inactivity in the Senate?
Why do the Senators sit back and do not legislate?
Because the barbarians will arrive today.
What sort of laws now can Senators enact?
When the barbarians come, they’ll do the legislating.
– Why is our emperor up and about so early,
and seated at the grandest gate of our city, upon the throne,
in state, wearing the crown?
Because the barbarians will arrive today.
And the emperor expects to receive their leader.
Indeed, he has prepared to present him
with a parchment scroll. Thereon he has
invested him with many names and titles.
– Why have our two consuls and the praetors come out
today in their purple, embroidered togas;
why did they put on bracelets studded with amethysts,
and rings with resplendent, glittering emeralds;
why are they carrying today precious staves
carved exquisitely in gold and silver?
Because the barbarians will arrive today
and such things dazzle the barbarians.
– And why don’t our worthy orators, as always, come out
to deliver their speeches, to have their usual say?
Because the barbarians will arrive today;
and they get bored with eloquence and orations.
– Why has there suddenly begun all this commotion,
and this confusion? (How solemn people’s faces have become.)
Why are the streets and the squares emptying so swiftly,
and everyone is returning home in deep preoccupation?
Because night has fallen and the barbarians have not come.
And some people have arrived from the frontiers,
and said that there are no barbarians anymore.
—
And now, what will become of us without barbarians?
Those people were some sort of a solution.