Derek Mahon: Love Not War

Length / Form A central ten-line stanza between two eight-line stanzas, laid out on the page in imitation of the elegiac meter (with alternate lines indented). The poem uses a shifting rhyme scheme, with rhymed couplets for the middle section.

Allusion to Classical figure Augustus, Cynthia, Sextus (i.e. Sextus Propertius)

Allusion to Classical place Indus

Relationship to Classical text Contemporary colloquial language (e.g. "brawn beats brain", "arms trade", "healthy profit") melds the personae of Propertius and Mahon.

Close translation of words/phrases/excerpts  The poem is a reworking of Propertius' Elegies III, 4 and 5

Classical/post-Classical intertexts  By adding in geographical locations not given in the soure text, Mahon draws parallels with British colonialism ("our wagons groaning with the spoils of war/ [...] 'Patna', 'Kandahar'").

Comment The last four lines strongly evoke the sentiment of 'Resistance Days' (Harbour Lights, 2005). Compare his resolution there "to study weather, clouds and their formation" with this condensed reworking of Propertius III, 5: "I'll spend my old age studying natural things,/ [...] the close relationship of clouds and springs".

The Sextus and Cynthia poems were first published in a limited edition (Oldcastle: The Gallery Press, 2009).