I'm two paragraphs into Poseidon's chapter in Ancient Greek Cults by Jennifer Larson and I'm already wanting to bite something

(re)reading Challenges to the power of Zeus in early Greek poetry and yeah it IS true that poseidon always chooses the side of hera in disputes with zeus. and it IS true that in stories of olympian gods challenging zeus for real poseidon is nearly always involved. and the fact that poseidon is FULLY absent from the homeric hymn to demeter (despite his mythological ties to demeter otherwise-and appearance in the lykosourian versions of the myth) IS poignant in a hymn otherwise occupied with zeus consolodating his rule further by buying hades' loyalty to him.

and this scholar makes a point of how often cosmic/divine strife is overlooked as a popular theme in (earl) Greek poetry and i SO agree like even in homeric epic there's an underlying tension to the reign of zeus at all times and his manipulation of mortal matters is always motivated by it. and it's DELICIOUS. delicious delicious divine tension and vulnerability.

Look! Seahorses!

@cat-with-no-name ur so fucking right

Not to get serious on the funny jokes website, but no -- Poseidon's horse associations actually predate his ocean associations.

In the old bronze-age Mycenaean culture (who the Ancient Greeks saw the way we see the Ancient Greeks), "Posedao" was known as the Earthshaker and king of the gods, and was strongly associated with horse imagery for reasons we don't really understand. Possibly they drew a connection between earthquakes and the thunder of hooves, or something like that, but that's probably too simplistic. More likely there's some lost mythological link -- but on the other hand, horses are powerful animals and gods just pick up associations like that sometimes.

Then the bronze age collapse happened and we lost a few centuries, and when the fog of history clears, Poseidon is suddenly the ocean god, Zeus is in charge, and Poseidon has kept that whole horse thing for no clear reason.

Today, 8th of Gamos (Argos) I pray to Poseidon Prosklystios to spare us his wrath.

Poseidon’s Wrath by GBrush

Poseidon abraça-terras, Deus altíssimo

Das profundezas, o Senhor

De navios, Salvador

Da terra, Sustentador

Deus de ânimo irrepreensível

De forte voz e coração marítimo

Salve a ti que guias o mar e o meu

Âmago nas tormentas.

English:

Earth-embracer Poseidon, God Most High

Of the fathoms, the Lord

Of the ships, Saviour

Of the Earth, Sustainer

God of unstoppable spirit

With a strong voice and maritime heart

Hail to you who guide the sea and my

Heart in the storms.

source

“Epic makes of Poseidon a great lord of the sea, emerging from his palace under the waves near Aegae to aid the Achaeans in battle, or rousing a storm to drown Odysseus on his raft. But Poseidon himself is a complex Mycenaean deity whose origins lie further inland; he is the Earth-Shaker, an ancestral god with ties to freshwater springs and horses. Even in the Iliad (13.10–30), the dominant image is that of Poseidon as a charioteer, driving his golden-maned horses over the sea. He himself is not a personification of the sea, but its ruler. If Poseidon is a lord of elemental forces, his Nereid consort Amphitrite is more closely identified in the Odyssey with the element itself: she breeds many monsters (Odyssey 5.417–22, 12.90) and the waves are hers (Odyssey 3.85, 12.55). Amphitrite is more than a literary invention; she often appears in cultic contexts with Poseidon, as at Isthmia (Pausanias 2.1.7). An archaic votive dump at Penteskouphia near Corinth yielded clay pinakes depicting Amphitrite with smaller-sized worshipers, or riding in a chariot with Poseidon.

In Greek mythology, the gods who represent the sea share its unbounded nature as the source of creatures formless and strange to human eyes. Monsters and shape-shifters, the latter often possessed of prophetic powers, come from the sea. Nereus and his congeners Proteus and Glaucus are Masters of Animals who control the supply of fish and other marine animals. In Greek fishermen’s folklore, these Old Men of the Sea were elusive shape-changers who could tell one’s fortune if captured. In Greek religious practice, on the other hand, the overriding concern with regard to the sea was safe travel. Many gods could be called upon to protect mariners, especially those resident in harbor towns (often Aphrodite or Poseidon). The Dioscuri, who appeared in ships’ rigging during storms in the form of St Elmo’s fire, were popularly viewed as saviors who warded off disaster at sea (Alcaeus fr. 34 Campbell).

Homer was also instrumental in shaping the image of the sea nymphs called Nereids, who were closely associated with the story of Achilles. Thetis, the Nereid mother of the hero, seems to have played an important role in early Greek cosmology; the Iliad alludes to her rescue and/or sheltering of Zeus, Dionysus, and Hephaestus in their times of need, while she figures in a fragment of Alcman as ‘‘the origin of all,’’ a primal creative force (Calame 1983 fr. 81). Thetis was destined to bear a son more powerful than his father and thus posed a threat to any god, including Zeus, who pursued her. Like Ge, she was imagined as a powerful primordial figure, who first threatened, then helped to bring about, the cosmic order, allowing herself to be subordinated in the process. Slatkin (1991:79) relates Thetis’ humble status in Homeric epic to the fact that her cult, unlike those of the Olympian gods, remained geographically limited. One of the few cults of Thetis belonged to Cape Sepias in Thessaly, where the Persians, having suffered heavy damage in a storm, sacrificed to her and the Nereids as local deities (Herodotus 7.191). A venerable Spartan cult of Thetis (Pausanias 3.14.4) may have inspired Alcman’s cosmological verses. Altars and thank offerings to the Nereids as a group, on the other hand, are relatively common. Like other marine deities, they could prevent disasters at sea. An early example is Sappho’s prayer to Cypris (Aphrodite) and the Nereids (fr. 5 Campbell) for the safe sea journey of her brother Charaxus. Ino/Leucothea, who was transformed into a Nereid after leaping from a cliff into the sea, saved Odysseus from drowning by giving him her magical veil (Odyssey 5.33–8). With her son Palaemon, also a sea-god and guardian of ships, Ino was honored at Poseidon’s sanctuary of Isthmia and elsewhere. Leucothea and Palaemon possessed a dual identity as drowned mortals (hence the chthonic and funerary elements in their cults) and as reborn gods who offered salvation to sailors in peril and the hope of an afterlife to those who drowned. Far more than the terrestrial nymphs, the Nereids were associated with death and rebirth. In epic, they play an important role as mourners of Patroclus and Achilles (Iliad 18.282–313; Odyssey 24.45–89), while post-Homeric literature and art focused on their ability to confer a blessed afterlife on the deceased, just as Thetis brought Achilles to the White Island in the Euxine where he was immortalized.”

 - Jennifer Larson, A Land Full of Gods: Nature Deities in Greek Religion (A Companion to Greek Religion)

Natalie Díaz, from “exhibits from The American Water Museum”, Postcolonial Love Poem

Prayer to Poseidon in hard times/Prece a Poseidon em momentos difíceis.

Ó Poseidon, que os mares governa Brandindo o tridente acalma a tormenta Que sacode o coração tempestuoso Daquele que reza teu nome chuvoso Trazei sabedoria de velejar o que sinto E a força de nadar a todo momento.

english:

O Poseidon, ruler of the seas Brandishing the trident calms the storm That shakes the tempestuous heart Of the one who prays thy rainy name Bringeth wisdom to sail what I feel And the strength to swim at all times.

(this one only rhymes in portuguese)

The ocean knows you by what you leave behind, pouring into your pressed sand-prints to learn the tides of your gait. Its waves sweep your hollows into its own, tumbled through the rolling sand, another taste of you for the undertow. It laps at your feet and asks "yet? is it yet?" The ocean is vast. The ocean is deep. It rasps your name in salt.

Poseidon by Denver Balbaboco

Stop running from the storms, my friend. Sweep violent as a hurricane and soft as the summer rain, driving as slanted glass-shard-drops and patient as the dew waiting for dawn. Dance as lightning crackles on your skin and rain beads on your brow. Break lake-banks, eating up land beneath your waves like some gnawing, clawing sea-beast, translucent and wild with liberty. Rage for the storm, weep for the rain, and there will be no sun to keep you tamed.

A prayer for guidance 🌊

O Poseidon, with wildest heart Grant me thy blessing, To continue on this path, And learn all that I can from your Vast oceans of knowledge. Guide me in your power and I will be thankful for your influence. Khaire