Euenus

Euenus (or Evenus; Greek: Εὔηνος) of Paros was a 5th-century BC Greek poet who was roughly contemporary with Socrates.

Quotes

Ah for pity drop the prize;
   Let it not, with truth, be said
That a songster gasps and dies,
   That a songster may be fed.

• Ἀτθὶ κόρα μελίθρεπτε, λάλος λάλον ἁρπάξασα
  τέττιγα πτανοῖς δαῖτα φέρεις τέκεσιν,
  τὸν λάλον ἁ λαλόεσσα, τὸν εὔπτερον ἁ πτερόεσσα,
  τὸν ξένον ἁ ξείνα, τὸν θερινὸν θερινά;
  κοὐχὶ τάχος ῥίψεις; οὐ γὰρ θέμις, οὐδὲ δίκαιον,
  ὄλλυσθ᾽ ὑμνοπόλους ὑμνοπόλοις στόμασιν.
  • Honey-nurtured child of Athens, is it a prattling cicada that thy prattling self has caught and carries for a feast to thy winged brood? Dost thou, the chatterer, prey on the chatterer; thou, the winged, on the winged; thou, the guest of summer, on the guest of summer? Wilt thou not drop it at once; it is neither meet nor just that singers should perish by mouths skilled in song.
  • Palatine Anthology, Book 9, no. 122 (ed. W. R. Paton, vol. 3)
    • Attic maid! with honey fed,
         Bear’st thou to thy callow brood
      Yonder locust from the mead
         Destin’d their delicious food?
      Ye have kindred voices clear
         Ye alike unfold the wing
      Migrate hither, sojourn here,
         Both attendant on the spring,
      Ah for pity drop the prize;
         Let it not, with truth, be said
      That a songster gasps and dies,
         That a songster may be fed.
      • "To the Swallow", translated by William Cowper, Life, and Posthumous Writings, ed. W. Haley (1803) vol. 2, p. 310. Other translations: W. M. W. Call, Golden Histories, etc. (London: Smith, Elder & Co, 1871) p. 299 · Norman Douglas, Birds and Beasts of the Greek Anthology (1928) n.p. · John Peale Bishop, Collected Poems, ed. Allen Tate (New York: C. Scribner's Sons, 1948) p. 173