The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel
Page 57
“Dear friend, I’m not a ghost. Here, grasp a flesh of clay,
place here your hand against my heart; it leaps for joy;
may God be praised, earth is so small we meet once more.” 200
He laughed so that his sleeping comrades blinked their eyes,
and seeing Granite there, a sunshot stately column,
they cried, fell on his neck and smothered him with kisses.
Broad-buttocked glutton wiped his wet eyes secretly:
“To think that we’ve been mourning you as lost, and now— 205
good going!—you come with horses and a lord’s high plumes!
Your freedom from the yoke, I see, has done you good.”
The piper marveled at his towering body, his strong steed:
“I dreamt of a huge dragon, and my poor brains shook:
four-eared, six-footed, double-rumped, with musk-drenched tail!” 210
Granite ignored the laughter and toward his master turned:
“My heart was bitter when you left, I checked my pain,
trudged down the river alone and felt my shoulders ache;
by God, I swear they felt as though they’d burst with wings!
Lone man, you cast a heavy shadow; what great joy 215
to rise one morning and find the fearful lion gone!
I walked the earth and felt my heels had sprouted wings;
never in all my life had I felt such fierce joy,
for freedom also strikes a man’s mind like strong wine.
One morning by the bank I chanced on my blood-brother, 220
Rocky, who also beat his fledgling wings with fear;
we gave our hearts a hitch, then parted to find out
if we, too, had some value in this world or were
but the oars, masts, and trapping of your ship, Odysseus!
Rocky chose to plunge south; I took a northern route 225
nor knew toward where I went nor did my mind once ask;
each morning I awoke and found a new creation
as though a new soul every day were born within me.
One evening as I roamed about the greening shores
I saw a forest of slim masts crowd the near banks; 230
strong bodies leapt the sands, and deep in muddy earth
plunged lances tipped with iron, as long as two tall men.
I liked their virile odor, longed for their wild breath,
and seized an iron lance until my mind blazed too.”
The cunning fisher marveled and then cast his bait: 235
“O stout bellwether, you’ve opened paths that we shall tread!
Now that we’ve chanced here too, and our bright stars have met,
let’s cleanse the world with flame, though we’re but kindling wood!
Rutting blond-bristling herds now swarm the desert sands
but they lack that great shepherd, Mind, to lead them through; 240
let’s join them, then, to give their dark desire eyes,
for they pursue a goal much higher than they know.”
But Granite frowned and clashed against his master’s will:
“I don’t ask where I go, nor care for hidden goals.
Arch-cunning man, don’t fire my fantasy, that whore 245
that makes my blood boil till I pour it in relief
and squander it without a care on any road!
Now if you love me, leave me, that I may not swerve
but follow my own footsteps and my native bent.”
The archer joyed to see his friend raise his head high 250
like a free man and spread his long wide wings for flight.
He longed for the first thrust of freedom to tear through
the bosoms of his friends one day like eagle-claws
until they freed themselves from his hard yoke, and flew,
but now he turned and seized his bold friend’s hastening wings: 255
“Granite, be patient yet awhile, for we must still
complete this task together with these barbarous hordes;
give in, sit on the ground and tell me the straight truth:
how many are they, what’s their strength and what’s their goal?”
Granite smiled wryly, sat on the ground cross-legged and said: 260
“Once more you seize and yoke me stealthily, you gadfly,
but I’ll be patient, for it pleases me to please you;
I’ll give you a crude account, dig out the fruit yourself.
They’ve sacked the towns and put all young men to the sword,
women they’ve dragged to slavery, cattle to slaughter-sheds, 265
nor left one small green spray in the luxuriant fields.
They’re all in rut, they’re weak with kisses, food, and drink,
some slay each other and share spoils at the sword’s point,
their brimming strength destroys them, and soon that day will come
when their strong flesh will fatten the sterile sands in rows. 270
What pity this fierce blaze must swirl and fade in smoke!”
The devious archer listened to his friend in thought,
and when he’d heard and weighed all well, he curbed his voice:
“That’s true, but the world’s rotted and bears no other sprout;
I think all hope on earth now, brother, has gathered around 275
these barbarous loins and shaggy chests that swirl about us,
and thus God often wills, that broncobuster of men.
But they’ll be crushed unless our minds can give them shape,
and we’ll be crushed, for now it seems that we’re all one.”
He spoke, then rose and tightly squeezed gaunt Granite’s hands: 280
“Forgive me if I still direct this holy task;
it’s right that only one head rule in times of crisis.”
Granite’s hot blood rose like a siphon in his heart:
“When at your side I toil, I think that I’m still free,
and each command of yours seems but my own deep will; 285
yet what relief to tear the writ that binds me to you!”
The great soul-leader laughed and then caressed his friend:
“It’s good for your own sake to stay with me awhile;
it does no good for a great soul to live and work
where still far greater souls than he don’t live in constant strife.” 290
And thus they spoke till daylight in the clanging din
that rose by the banksides from the disordered crowd.
Rala, new-washed, wearing the best of her poor robes,
a thick and glittering copper ring about one ankle,
sat in the middle of the public road, and waited. 295
All living creatures woke, storks fished in the dank mud,
small birds puffed up their breasts in light, their bellies breathed
with joy, filled full of eggs and strength and warbling song,
but flame-eyed Rala now recoiled with wrath, and thrust
beneath her headband two long locks the wind had blown. 300
She stooped, and on her headcloth the much-suffering man’s
thick precious bloodstains glittered in the morning’s light;
she’d sworn to plant it like a flag on the priests’ roof
but wound it like a shroud now round her raven hair,
and her heart melted from her desperate threnody. 305
She leapt up suddenly, hearing the tramp of marching feet,
perked up her ears, and heard but blood beat in her brow,
for no soul walked the roads, and she sat down once more.
Ah, could she block the middle of the road, dear God,
when workers passed and staggered to the archons’ whips, 310
and then scream out! What could she say? Turn back! Turn back!
Thus Rala stooped and wrung her heart, that black crow’s nest,
and as her fierce heart whipped the earth, waiting in fear,
tumult and shouts, brass weapons, sharp and whinnying sounds. 315
Rala dashed up, ecstatic, and opened her arms wide;
her nerveless limbs began to shake, her knees gave way,
she wished to utter a loud cry, but her throat choked,
she wished to cry out “Brothers!” but her tongue grew numb
and but one sound, a crow’s cry, “Kraa!” tore at her throat. 320
The Egyptian army rolled up swiftly, horses neighed,
snorted, and steamed about her slender naked limbs,
and she reached out her hands, beckoned, and waved her arms.
Amid the dustclouds her arms gleamed for a brief flash,
her downy doe-eyes for a moment shook with fear 325
in the thick mass of horses’ harness and bronze shields,
and then her pallid body suddenly sank in the stampede.
Seven black ravens swooped down in the smothering dusk
and, pecking hungrily everywhere for scraps of meat,
found but warm clots of blood, black strands of hair, and one 330
bronze anklet on a shattered bone that gleamed on the hot sands.
At that same hour, the archer watched the Egyptian troops
flooding the fields, wave after wave of black-haired heads
so numberless not even an apple could wedge between.
Although he frowned, he felt no chill run down his spine, 335
his hairy armpits were still cool, unsweated, dry,
but all his comrades shuddered, and the piper’s pate,
pallid with fear, poured with salt sweat in swift cascades:
“Their troops are endless, comrades! I can’t even count them!
If they should reach their hands to heaven, they’d blot the sun, 340
if all should spit together, a river would roll and drown us!”
He spoke, and his drenched clothes dripped with his salt sweat.
His vulture-minded chief caressed the wind-struck head:
“Comrades, the battle’s lost, there’s no salvation here,
but let’s choose freely, before swords clash, what road we want: 345
that one which leads toward death, or that which leads toward life;
let our four heads, that brim with brains, rise up to judge.”
But Granite, with an eagle’s stance, swiped at his master:
“Since when has the great archer asked us our opinion
when Death, the horseman, loomed up suddenly in our path? 350
And though he asks us now, he scorns our wretched honor.”
Then Orpheus gulped and raised a bold opposing head:
“I may be sickly, but I’ve not feared Death, God curse him!
Though I’m a seven-months’ child, that’s what my heart says too!
I’ve always stood prepared to give my flesh to earth 355
or let my slim flute-playing fingers rot and fall.
Thus with no shame or hindrance, I’ll also have my say:
Let’s fly! for he who spins great schemes is duty-bound
to hold his life in rich esteem and cast it off
only when his strong corpse will tilt the scales of fate; 360
but here we’ll die in vain for scraps of empty honor.”
Then double-buttocked Kentaur rose to speak his heart:
“Fellows, I know we’ll perish here in a skunk-trap!
You all know how I crave this slut, sweet-breasted life,
yet what can I do, alas? I’d blush to turn tail now!” 365
He glanced at his loved master and shyly dropped his eyes,
but he had cocked his cap askew, a sign of death:
“I too can’t quench my thirst for life, I love the light,
but I’ve seen much on earth, spanned all and measured all,
and found one thing to love and wear like a true charm: 370
I’ve always found that men who hold great goals on earth
squander their lives each daring moment heedlessly.
I see no hope—that’s why my heart cries out: ‘Don’t fly!’
Not that I feel ashamed or value stupid honor,
but in extreme despair some beast within me laughs.” 375
Then he fell silent, his eye lost in inner worlds,
but yet he always kept some back door of escape:
“Danger is good and suits me, but that opinion’s good
that holds the scales of fate and weighs each danger well.
See what my female brain has given birth to, friends: 380
We shall not wait for the foe to fall on us in sun,
but we ourselves shall pounce on their drowsy troops at night,
for patience, brothers, does not suit the desperate heart.”
He spoke, then swiftly strode toward the barbarian chiefs,
and his companions marveled at his lurching gait 385
as though earth were a ship’s deck tossed by surging storm.
“Now is the time to plant good words, like crimson plumes,
on the chiefs’ heads to give their minds courageous airs,”
thus thought the sly man, striding through the motley tents.
Those soon to die ate on the run, some bounced their sons, 390
and some were giving last commands to their dear mates
while Death stood over them and listened, though stone-deaf.
The archer thrust claw-footed Death aside, then passed
and at each chieftain cast sharp glances hung with hooks,
hung with much precious bait, and every hook a fish. 395
He seized the shoulders of a tribe-chief with forked beard,
with pure-white peacock feather’s on his lion