Editing Constantine P. Cavafy (section)

===Philosophical poems===
[[File:Thermopyles.jpg|thumb|268x268px|Manuscript of his poem ''Thermopylae'' (Θερμοπύλες).]]

Also called instructive poems, they are divided into poems with consultations to poets, and poems that deal with other situations such as isolation (for example, "The walls"), duty (for example, "Thermopylae"), and human dignity (for example, "[[The God Abandons Antony]]").

The poem "Thermopylae" reminds us of the famous [[battle of Thermopylae]] where the 300 Spartans and their allies fought against the greater numbers of Persians, although they knew that they would be defeated. There are some principles in our lives that we should live by, and Thermopylae is the ground of duty. We stay there fighting although we know that there is the potential for failure. (At the end the traitor [[Ephialtes of Trachis|Ephialtes]] will appear, leading the Persians through the secret trail).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://brushheadmusings.wordpress.com/2008/06/30/thermopylae-a-poem-on-the-good-kind-of-life/|title=Thermopylae – a poem on the good kind of life|date= 30 June 2008|access-date= 28 January 2018}}</ref>

In another poem, "In the Year 200 B.C.", he comments on the historical epigram "Alexander, son of Philip, and the Greeks, except of Lacedaemonians,...", from the donation of Alexander to Athens after the [[Battle of the Granicus]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=129&cat=1|title=C.P. Cavafy - Poems - The Canon|website=www.cavafy.com|access-date=28 January 2018}}</ref> Cavafy praises the [[Hellenistic era]] and idea, so condemning the closed-mind and localistic ideas about Hellenism. However, in other poems, his stance displays ambiguity between the [[Classical Greece|Classical]] ideal and the Hellenistic era (which is sometimes described with a tone of decadence).

Another poem is the Epitaph of a Greek trader from [[Samos]] who was sold into slavery in [[India]] and dies on the shores of the [[Ganges]]: regretting the greed for riches which led him to sail so far away and end up "among utter barbarians", expressing his deep longing for his homeland and his wish to die as "In [[Hades]] I would be surrounded by Greeks".