These are still men, take pity! O sky, stand still and judge!”
But his hard master’s ruthless voice thrashed out at once:
“I told you from the start: our god is a ruthless god,
his mind’s a pitiless sieve that winnows chaff from grain.”
“Pity the blameless children then. Don’t leave them here.” 470
“I pity them all, but nurses are a burden now.”
Then glutton growled and all his bellies tossed and heaved,
his eyes filled suddenly with tears and he moaned softly:
“Slayer, you’ve swallowed mankind whole in your cruel chest
till in your entrails’ root only a wild beast moves.” 475
“That’s true, you rattle-brained dumb fool! Do what you want!”
Good-hearted Kentaur sighed yet dared to speak once more:
“Though I’m a blockhead, slayer, I’ve still a human heart.
Women and children first, by God! I tell you, master,
I won’t leave them to death, with or without your leave!” 480
The archer’s eyes flashed fire like a savage beast’s:
“Aye, nanny, I see that your fat udders drip with milk!
Shove off, you fool! Go hang your head. These are not souls,
only green empty entrails, corpses that soon will rot,
but if you pity them in truth, then a good journey!” 485
He spoke, touched Granite’s arm, then signaled to the piper;
the drum beat for departure, and the chosen friends
began a swift song of the road and lunged through sand.
Kentaur stood in their midst, his great heart torn in two;
whether he tacked or hauled up sail, his ship was lost— 490
how might this clashing pair find place in his fat bulk?
But when a baby’s cry was heard on a dry breast,
all his vast body, like a mother’s, groaned and sighed:
“A fig, you murderer, for your spite! With or without
your courage, if I can, I’ll save these orphaned kids. 495
We, too, I think, have souls. Don’t ride your high horse now!”
He spurred his bulky body then and turned his face,
and as they took the rough road back, a mother swerved
to gaze for the last time on youths who steamed in heat,
but all at once she shrieked in fright and closed her eyes, 500
for the man-killer with his high cap plodded last
and on his black burnt back the savage mask hung down;
there the man-sucking god grinned in the torrid sun
and blood dropped clump by clump upon the spreading crimson sands.
The days lit flickering fires over their bare heads 505
and nights like chilling waters coursed along their backs;
young girls grew pale and thin, their eyes were ringed with blue,
and young men further tightened their lean hollow waists.
A great magician with the army once crouched low
and scratched on rocks wild game and birds to trap their souls, 510
but birds flew by in dazzling blaze and beasts loped off
and left the sad magician with but useless snares.
The sun rose from its oven like a round breadloaf
and scorched their famished bellies, wild game stalked their minds
like chubby gods who in their paws held man’s salvation, 515
but, merciless and silent, they would not draw near
nor sacrifice their flesh to save the human herd.
Around the fire at night Odysseus told his cares,
slowly unwound his snake-coiled voyages with skill
to cheat with words his comrades’ hunger and hot thirst. 520
One night, as all sat cross-legged on the sands, he felt
the young men press their knees against the young girls’ thighs,
and spun an ancient myth of how young men and maids
first met on earth and how the erotic fountain sprang.
He stroked his gray beard, and his thick lips dripped with honey: 525
“Blessed be the earth and water, and blessed be fire and air
that shape and join the soul and body of mortal man,
and blessed that master-craftsman who so planned all things
that some are stalwart men and some sweet-bedded maids.
My friends, now listen to an old myth as night calms down. 530
When, as folks say, the sky lived lovingly with earth,
fifty young women roamed the land, fifty young maids,
and fifty brave unmated young men roamed the wastes;
all still were fresh young shoots, new-sprung from Mother Earth,
and on their backs still bore fresh loam and greenest leaves. 535
The maidens drove on toward the North, the young men South,
the maidens opened their eyes wide, their wild hearts pulsed
with longing, their minds poured in long cascades and asked:
‘Green grass, tall tree, who may your father and mother be?’
‘The earth,’ thus murmured the green grass and the tall tree. 540
But still desire could not find rest in the maids’ hearts:
‘O earth, who was your mother, who can your father be?’
Earth roared then from her caves with a hoarse voice, ‘I live!’
nor did her mud-brain know how else she might reply.
At night the stars lit trailing fires in the dark sky 545
and young maids lay with sleepless eyes and heavy breasts:
‘Dear stars, who was it lit you first in the desolate sky?’
But the stars burned so far away, they could not hear.
The maids called day and night, but still no answer came.
One day when earth had filled with flowers and fields turned green, 550
the maids ran down in the fierce heat to the cool spring,
the youths converged in the fierce heat and ran to drink,
but when the young maids saw the youths, their wild hearts throbbed:
‘You there, you naked forms, what kind of beast are you?’
And the brave lads with their cracked youthful voices cawed: 555
We boast that we are men. And you, with rearing breasts?’
We bear the name of women, and we’ve no need of men!’
The stalwart youths laughed mockingly and crossed the grass:
‘As men, we shall drink first. Make way, bare-breasted beasts!’
We shall drink first!’ the maidens cried, and rushed the pool. 560
Thus from this proud word-battle, body on body clashed
so that from dawn till sunset the wild skirmish raged
as the young men fought fiercely for their loot of brides.
When the sun fell once more, a stalwart youth cried out:
‘Lads, seize them by their breasts and then they’ll lose their strength!’ 565
Night fell, and soon the stars leapt to adorn the sky,
the lions roared in their dark caves, the lovebirds sighed,
until at midnight the stars set, dawn broke in rose,
a small bird slowly flew and sang by the cool spring:
‘Dear God, the young men can’t remember, and the maids forget! 570
They ran to drink, but the kiss came, that fearful beast,
and stood before the spring till now there’s no unkissing!’
Full fifty sons were seeded in full fifty brides,
they gave me fifty cups to drink at the wedding feast, 574
but ah, alas, the wine but wet my thick mustache, 575
it never reached my lips nor even sweetened them. 576
All was a traceless dream, my lads; I woke, but see—
fifty young men and maids now clack their knees together!”
The sly man stopped, then laughed; the maids and lads laughed too,
but vet he never disclosed th
e heaviest word of all: 580
from that time on when maid meets man by the cool spring
they never question earth again nor gaze on stars,
but deep in earth they dig a fertile pit to breed and spawn.
Night passed, until at dawn the great disk-thrower cast
the sun like a vermilion quoit on the sky’s rim; 585
the drums resounded, and the young men leapt from sleep,
tossed from their heads the sweet seductions of the night
and once more plodded on the day’s coarse endless sands.
Granite first took the lead, and glittered like a star
with streaming banners, a lean-boned and noble form; 590
behind him swept like flames his hand-picked glowing youths,
and the pale piper hopped close by with his huge drum,
his neck embraced by wounds like coral crimson rings;
last came the silent archer, looking behind and after,
a porter who lugged his heavy god on his burnt back 595
and in the desert’s fiery glitter held his heart
like a refreshing water-gourd to slake his thirst.
A choking flame-ferocious wind sucked up the sands,
the sun grew dim as though eclipsed, the young men vanished,
and Granite’s tall shape in the sandstorm vanished too. 600
Then the man-killer stopped, a black flash crossed his mind:
old deadly battles and his memory’s ancient cries,
as though with other troops and in another life
where all drank wine and the mind crowed and his brave lads
had mounted their white steeds and dashed into the desert 605
with their black twisted headbands, with their drums and weapons
to fight the fiery whirlwind with their gleaming spears.
As they thrust deep in the sand’s furnace, all at once
a huge wind loomed and the sand-mountains heaved like waves,
rose and swelled slowly, then once more came settling down, 610
but ah, alas, what had become of the brave youths?
Odysseus thus recalled his once sand-smothered boys
and silently watched his youths on the sea-sands until
it seemed to him they dashed once more to the assault.
But as he looked before and after, he spied a girl 615
some distance from the troops who bent her body low
and with cupped hands spilled water on the sterile sands
as though she nourished some small plant in slow farewell.
Swept by a frenzied rage, he dashed on the young maid
who in her place of sleep had found a small blue flower, 620
transplanted it with care, and now in watering it
was trembling in her heart nor wished to leave the desert.
The fiery guide of God reaching out his flaming hands,
entwined them in her hair three times with mounting wrath
and three times shook her like a sack and dashed her down: 625
“I’ve said I won’t have flowers, not even one green blade,
planted in this wild waste nor on the roads we pass,
for then the heart takes root and never again will leave!”
He stamped on the frail flower then with his bare feet
and ground it wrathfully in the sand as the girl moaned. 630
At night when all fell down with hunger, limp and drained,
he stood erect by the huge drum, beat it and cried:
“Friends, I repeat what I’ve once said, and make it law:
so long as this road lasts and our goal’s still to seek,
no soul shall plant not one green leaf in these dry sands. 635
Who plants a tree becomes a tree and roots in land,
who builds a house becomes a threshold, window, roof,
who holds a baby in his arms betrays our God!”
He spoke, then lay down brooding on the sands, alone,
and his mind moved and took untrodden hidden paths 640
and pushed his secret thoughts toward steep man-eating cliffs:
“To all laws I’ll erect contrary secret laws
that must deny with scorn and smash all former laws;
only great daring souls may with all perils play
and plant trees, sons, and houses freely in all lands 645
because for them, root or uprooting, life or death,
are one, and one the first hail and the last farewell forever.
Now I must beat the drum to announce the public law
and trust contrary laws to but a few rare minds.”
Such were the dragon eggs he hatched in the still calm, 650
and like a small child playing, dug deep wells in sand,
shaped houses, streets and towers, and in tall battlements
erected a dead scarab-god, then cast ant-hordes
till the small sand-ways swarmed with seething bustling life.
“Ah, I’ve become a child again and play with sand,” 655
he thought, and while his white-winged mind smiled inwardly
he suddenly spread his hands and scattered town and all.
Far off on a smooth beach, upon a distant shore,
a small, an only son, came toddling by the waves
and held a fig in his right hand, then turned with glee 660
and faced his laughing mother who placed another fig
in his left palm so that both hands might weigh the same.
But when the father came and stood beside the gate
and smiled and softly clapped his hands, his small son turned
and opened his plump palms and laughed like a sun’s ray. 665
Telemachus gave a shout and ran to catch his child
and the young mother rushed till both seized him together;
the happy couple laughed, and when the small child touched
her crystal shoulder tenderly, the young bride’s breasts,
brimming with milk, pulsed with a fragrant warmth and life: 670
“I fear he grows more like his grandfather day by day.
Look at his spite, his glance, the way he holds the figs;
alas, I see the traits of your dread father here.
Where can he be, dear God, where in this holy hour?”
At the same hour, far off, the wandering grandfather raised 675
his burning feet and crushed the frail toy town of sand:
“For shame! I’m not a child! New toys consume me now.”
He laid his head, that thick beehive, on the smooth sand
so that his thoughts might close their wings like honeybees,
content that this day, too, the poisoned wastes had been well gleaned. 680
The sun exploded, and the piper cried with joy:
“My eye keeps twitching, I foresee some great good coming!
I dreamt of our broad-buttocked friend; they brought him dead
with bagpipes and with drums until the earth roared back,
for funerals, lads, in my home town, look much-like weddings.” 685
But his companions turned their backs and plowed ahead;
they could not joke, for hunger roped their choking throats.
The features of the seven-souled enflamed man darkened,
but still the piper on his cricket-legs hopped close,
slitted his small squint-eyes and threw out taunts and gibes: 690
“You aimed and shot yourself! You fell in your own trap!
In vain your murderous heart digs pits, in vain digs deep,
for it still mourns the women and children you sent to die!”
But the archer turned away and mocked the air-brained fool:
“Our cock-eyed fisher casts his bait, let come what may! 695
I don’t think twice for such as the earth breeds in swarms,
but ah, broad-buttocked Kentaur’s pain tears at my heart.”
He spoke, then hurrie
d ahead to hide his brimming eyes,
but as he rushed, he suddenly stopped and held his breath
as though he’d heard the vanguard leader’s joyous cry. 700
Then he sped swiftly, stopped again, and cupped his ears
till he heard Granite clearly shout, “A town! A town!”
and watched his youths and maidens fly with feathered feet,
for in the middle of the desert a green grove swelled
and in the sunlight thatched huts gleamed, row after row, 705
and sheep with bells about their necks browsed on green grass.
The friends fell prone at once to hide all living trace
from the town’s sentries, who stood upright on tall stands,
but the mind-spinner watched in silence and knit his heart
for fear they once more saw but the mind’s vain mirage. 710
Closing his eyes, he pressed his ears against the earth
and heard dogs barking and bells ringing and cries of men,
then flung himself upon the ground with his lean scouts.
The friends clashed in opinion as they watched the town;
first Granite spread out swiftly a bold plan of attack: 715
“Let’s fall upon them now before they get their wind up,
and plunder their deep holds and fall on their fat flocks;
behind us cliffs of famine lie, and a feast before us.”
But the more prudent thought of sly, more peaceful means,
and the foxy-minded man dug in his brains for tricks— 720
how like a passing beggar he might case the town,
mark down its ins and outs, the entrances, the exits,
and snare the houses with no trace at dead of night.
Crouched on the sand, the pirates mulled through all these plans
while the town’s sentry, high upon his scorching stand, 725
spied on the earth around him with round hawklike eyes.
The day was tranquil as a beast in heavy sleep,
the meadows steamed, the cows upon the greensward gleamed,
the chief’s bean gardens and his cornfields swelled with fruit,
farmhands and spindly children drew up from the wells 730
cool gurgling water, then stooped above their fertile plots.
The eye looked and rejoiced at all the good things round
like a great king who sits on high and rules his land.
The sentry could no longer hold himself, and leapt for joy,
all he could see was his, held tight in his possession: 735
that bride who led her flock to the cool spring, she too
was his, his eye reached out and seized her like an arm.
He looked on melon-plots far off, and his throat cooled,
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