Mystic Fragments of Parmenides

A Youthful Journey ~ toward Knowing Justice
By Parmenides

These mares who carry me as far as longing can reach, rode on.
Once they had come and fetched me
onto the legendary road of the divinity
that carries the man who knows
through the vast and dark unknown ~

And on I was carried, as the mares, aware just where to go,
kept carrying me, straining at the chariot;
and young women led the way.
And the Axle in the hubs let out a sound of a pipe;

Blazing from the pressure of the two well rounded wheels at either side.
As they rapidly led on; young women; girls, daughters of the Sun ~
Who had left the mansions of the night for the light,
pushed back the veils from their faces with their hands.

There to the Gates; on the pathways of Night and Day.
Held fast in place between the lintels above and the threshold of stone.
They reach right up into the heavens filled with gigantic doors.
And the keys now open, now lock; are held fast by Justice;
She who always demands exact returns.

And with soft seductive words the girls cunningly persuaded her
To push back immediately, just for them, the bar that bolts the gates.
And as the doors flew open, making the bronze axles with their pegs and nails spin ~
Now one, now the other ~ in their pipes they created a gaping chasm.
Straight through and on, the girls held fast their course, for the chariot and horses,
Straight down the road.

And the Goddess welcomed me kindly
and took my right hand in hers and spoke these words
As she addressed me:

Welcome young man, partnered by immortal charioteers,
reaching our home with the mares that carry you.
For it was no hard fate that sent you traveling this road ~
so far away from the beaten track of humans; but of Rightness and Justice.

And what’s needed is for you to learn all things;
Both the unshaken heart of persuasive Truth and the opinions of mortals
in which there is nothing that can truthfully be trusted at all.
But even so, this too you will learn ~
how beliefs based on appearances ought to be believable
for they move all through all there is.

From the book; with minor adaptations for this page
Do read the book review

<a href=”http://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2004/2004-07-43.html&#8221; title=”Book Review“>

Also;
http://classweb.gmu.edu/rcherubi/ancient/poem4.htm
http://philoctetes.free.fr/parmenidesunicode.htm
http://www.parmenides.com/about_parmenides/ParmenidesPoem.html
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/parmenides/