by Alice Oswald
Arrogant farmhand fresh from the fields
He went straight for Agamemnon
Aiming for the soft bit under the breastplate
And leaning in pushing all his violence
All his crazy impatience into the thrust
But he couldn’t quite break through the belt-metal
Against all that silver the spear-tip
Simply bent like lead and he lost
Poor Iphidamas now he is only iron
Sleeping its iron sleep poor boy
Who fought for Helen for his parents’ town
Far from his wife all that money wasted
A hundred cattle he gave her
A thousand sheep and goats
All that hard work feeding them wasted
Grief is black it is made of earth
It gets into the cracks in the eyes
It lodges its lump in the throat
When a man sees his brother on the ground
He goes mad he comes running out of nowhere
Lashing without looking and that was how COON died
First he wounded Agamemnon
Then he grabbed his brother’s stiffened foot
And tried to drag him home shouting
Help for god’s sake this is Iphidamas
Someone please help but Agamemnon
Cut off his head and that was that
Two brothers killed on the same morning by the same man
That was their daylight here finished
And their long nightshift in the underworld just beginning
Like when two winds want a wood
The south wind and the east wind
Both pull at the trees’ arms
And the sound of smooth-skinned cornel whipping to and fro
And oak and ash batting long sticks together
Is a word from another world
Like when two winds want a wood
The south wind and the east wind
Both pull at the trees’ arms
And the sound of smooth-skinned cornel whipping to and fro
And oak and ash batting long sticks together
Is a word from another world
ASAEUS
AUTONOOS
OPITES
DOLOPS
OPHELTIUS
AGELAOS
AESYMNUS
ORUS
HIPPONOUS
THYMBRAIUS
MOLION
Like fawns running over a field
Suddenly give up and stand
Puzzled in their heavy coats
Like fawns running over a field
Suddenly give up and stand
Puzzled in their heavy coats
Also ADRESTUS and AMPHIUS
Everyone knew they were going to die
They were the sons of Merops the prophet
He begged them to stay at home but they couldn’t listen
Their own ghosts were calling them to Troy
Immaculate in clean linen
They set out together but Death
Was already walking to meet them
Like a goatherd stands on a rock
And sees a cloud blowing towards him
A black block of rain coming closer over the sea
Pushing a ripple of wind inland
He shivers and drives his flocks into a cave for shelter
Like a goatherd stands on a rock
And sees a cloud blowing towards him
A black block of rain coming closer over the sea
Pushing a ripple of wind inland
He shivers and drives his flocks into a cave for shelter
And HIPPODAMOS died
Like a traveller trudging across a plain
Who comes to a river and stands helpless
Looking down at that foamy swiftness sweeping to the sea
And takes a step back
And HYPEIROCHOS died
Like a farm boy looking after the pigs
Who tries to cross a river in a rainstorm
And gets swept away
Typical competitive pride and madness
Made AGASTRAPHUS get out of his chariot
And walk and keep walking with no back-up
No friend no horse as far as the front line
Of course he was wounded he lay dying
Thinking if only if only the mind
Was more straightforward and efficient
What was I doing thinking I could walk
Through all that iron on my own
And us
Said THOON
ENNOMUS
CHERSIDAMAS
Like a fish in the wind
Jumps right out of its knowledge
And lands on the sand
Like a fish in the wind
Jumps right out of its knowledge
And lands on the sand
Come back to your city SOCUS
Your father is a rich man a breeder of horses
And your house has deep decorated baths and long passages
But he and his brother weren’t listening
Like men on wire walking over the underworld
CHAROPS died first killed by Odysseus
Then Socus who was running by now
Felt the rude punch of a spear in his back
Push through his heart and out the other side poor Socus
Trying to get away from his own ending
Ran out his last moments in fear of the next ones
But this is it now this is the mud of Troy
This is black wings coming down every evening
Bird’s feathers on your face
Unmaking you mouthful by mouthful
Eating your eyes your open eyes
Which your mother should have closed
Like when the wind comes ruffling at last to sailors adrift
Trying to manage the broken springs of their muscles
And lever and lift those well-rubbed oars
Making tiny dents in the ocean
Like when the wind comes ruffling at last to sailors adrift
Trying to manage the broken springs of their muscles
And lever and lift those well-rubbed oars
Making tiny dents in the ocean
And
DORYCLES
PANDOCUS
LYSANDER
PYRASUS
PYLARTES
APISAON
All vigorous men
All vanished
Like in Autumn under the dripping wind
The earth’s clothes grow heavy she can hardly stand
God rains on the roof hammering his fists down
He has had enough of violent smiling men
Now every one of us is being looked at
Under the rain’s lens
Now the rivers are filling they are overfilling
There are streams sawing through hills
Cutting up the grass into islands
Everything is clattering to the sea
This is water’s world
And the works of men are vanishing
Like in Autumn under the dripping wind
The earth’s clothes grow heavy she can hardly stand
God rains on the roof hammering his fists down
He has had enough of violent smiling men
Now every one of us is being looked at
Under the rain’s lens
Now the rivers are filling they are overfilling
There are streams sawing through hills
Cutting up the grass into islands
Everything is clattering to the sea
This is water’s world
And the works of men are vanishing
DAMASOS the Trojan
Running at a man thinking kill kill
In years to come someone will find his helmet
Shaped like a real head
And PYLON
ORMENOS
HIPPOMACHOS
ANTIPHATES
MENON
IAMENOS
ORESTES
Like the war cries of cranes going south escaping the rain
Every winter the clang of their wings going over us
And the shock of their parachutes
Landing on someone else’s fields
Like the war cries of cranes going south escaping the rain
Every winter the clang of their wings going over us
And the shock of their parachutes
Landing on someone else’s fields
EPICLES a Southerner from sunlit Lycia
Climbed the Greek wall remembering the river
That winds between his wheatfields and his vineyards
He was knocked backwards by a rock
And sank like a diver
The light in his face went out
Like the shine of a sea swell
Lifting and flattening silently
When water makes way for the wind
And dreams of its storms
Huge waves hang in a hush
Uncertain which way to fall
Until a breeze breaks them
Like the shine of a sea swell
Lifting and flattening silently
When water makes way for the wind
And dreams of its storms
Huge waves hang in a hush
Uncertain which way to fall
Until a breeze breaks them
Honourable IMBRIOS left his house in Pedaios
And took lodgings in a drafty street in Troy
He could have been a rich man
He married Priam’s daughter Medesicaste
But his marriage was a death warrant
How can you kiss a rolling head
Even AMPHIMACHOS died and he was a rarity
A green-eyed changeable man from Elis
He was related to Poseidon
You would think the sea could do something
But it just lifted and flattened lifted and flattened
Like a stone
Stands by a grave and says nothing
Like a stone
Stands by a grave and says nothing
In this love-story there was a man
Who wanted to marry Cassandra
And she was Priam’s bright-eyed neurotic
Most beautiful daughter
And he was OTHRYON the dreamer
Who came from Cabesus with no money
When he offered his life for her hand
Her father accepted
And so the dreamer went blushing into battle and died
And everyone laughed and laughed
Except Cassandra
Like a deer in the hills wounded
Keeps running in pain
There are dogs following her bloodprints
But she goes on and on escaping into loneliness
To the very breaking of her being
Until it happens in some shadowy wood on a hilltop
She gives up
And the dogs set about eating her
But at last at evening a lion appears
A huge angel wandering the hills laying claim to the dead
And the dogs scatter
At last at evening a lion appears
A huge angel wandering the hills laying claim to the dead
And the dogs scatter
Oh ASIUS ASIUS how has he done this
Now he bangs down his knuckles on his knees
He feels so luminous stupid
Sitting in god’s headlights trembling
In the narrow opening to the grave
He was told to dismount
And proceed on foot to the Greek camp
But he couldn’t hear he couldn’t stop
Having ridden those shining horses
Over the Selleis and the Simois
And all the stony way from Arisbe to Troy
Like when winnowers bang their shovels down
Black beans and chickpeas jump in the wind
Their seed-shrouds flit along the ground
Like when winnowers bang their shovels down
Black beans and chickpeas jump in the wind
Their seed-shrouds flit along the ground
Somebody’s husband somebody’s daughter’s husband
Stood there stunned by fear
Like a pillar like a stunted tree
He couldn’t bend his stones
He couldn’t walk his roots
His armour was useless it simply
Cried out and broke open oh
There stood ALCATHOUS and a spear
Knowing nothing of his wedding
Not knowing his feelings or his wife’s face
Or her doting parents or her incredible needlework
That spear went straight through his heart
And began to tick tick tick but not for love
Like a knife-winged hawk
Balanced on a cliff with no foothold
Not even a goat can climb there
Like when he lifts his blades and begins
That faultless fall
Through the birds of the valley
Like a knife-winged hawk
Balanced on a cliff with no foothold
Not even a goat can climb there
Like when he lifts his blades and begins
That faultless fall
Through the birds of the valley
OINOMAOS
ASKALAPHOS
APHAREUS
THOON
ANTILOCHUS
DEIPUROS
PEISANDER
HARPALION not quite ready for life
Not quite solid always shifting from foot to foot
With his eyes sliding everywhere in fear
Followed his father to war
He never came back to that house
Three storeys high on the River Parthenios
It was horrible the death-howl
Of the father finding him gone
Like deer always moving on and looking back
Knowing they are wanted by wolves they keep
Stepping away through the pillars of the woods
Knowing their guests are waiting
Like deer always moving on and looking back
Knowing they are wanted by wolves they keep
Stepping away through the pillars of the woods
Knowing their guests are waiting
EUCHENOR a kind of suicide
Carried the darkness inside him of a dud choice
Either he could die at home of sickness
Or at Troy of a spearwound
His mother was in tears
His father was in tears but
Cold as a coin he took the second option
Seeing as otherwise he’d have had to pay a fine
It was no surprise when an arrow pierced his neck
He recognised that prick of darkness
Like a stallion tugging at a rope breaks loose at last
And his gallop is a drumbeat shaking the valley
There he goes heading straight for the river
Longing to wash in that clattering rush of cold
When he holds his head high and runs like a king
Under the wind-blown banner of his mane
Then he knows his knees are going to lift him forever
And a grassy cloth has been spread on the fields for his pleasure
Like a stallion tugging at a rope breaks loose at last
And his gallop is a drumbeat shaking the valley
There he goes heading straight for the river
Longing to wash in that clattering rush of cold
When he holds his head high and runs like a king
Under the wind-blown banner of his mane
Then he knows his knees are going to lift him forever
And a grassy cloth has been spread on the fields for his pleasure
Who could be more ordinary than SATNIUS
The son of Water
When he died the River was so cold
&
nbsp; You’d never think it was his mother
And PROTHOENOR died
And then a spear with its own willpower
Flying towards another man
Chose to miss him at the last minute
And struck ARCHELOCHUS
Like the changing mind
That moves a cloud off a mountain
And makes rocks and cliffs appear
Pushing the landshape’s sharp edges up
Through more and more air
Like the changing mind
That moves a cloud off a mountain
And makes rocks and cliffs appear
Pushing the landshape’s sharp edges up
Through more and more air
Then PROMACHUS fell forgetting everything
Like when they’re cutting ash poles in the hills
The treetops fall as soft as cloth
Like when they’re cutting ash poles in the hills
The treetops fall as soft as cloth
ILIONEUS an only child ran out of luck
He always wore that well-off look
His parents had a sheep farm
They didn’t think he would die
But a spear stuck through his eye
He sat down backwards
Trying to snatch back the light
With stretched out hands
Like oak trees swerving out of the hills
And setting their faces to the wind
Day after day being practically lifted away
They are lashed to the earth
And never let go
Gripping on darkness
Like oak trees swerving out of the hills
And setting their faces to the wind
Day after day being practically lifted away
They are lashed to the earth
And never let go
Gripping on darkness
Now STICHIUS has gone and ARCESILAUS
Like smoke leaving the earth vanishing up
When a town is under attack on a faraway island
All day in a trance of war men murder each other
But at dusk silence only the fingers of fires
Lifting their question to the mainland
Is there anybody there please help
Like smoke leaving the earth vanishing up
When a town is under attack on a faraway island
All day in a trance of war men murder each other
But at dusk silence only the fingers of fires
Lifting their question to the mainland
Is there anybody there please help
Poor wandering MEDON born out of wedlock
Stuck his hand into this ice-cold world
And didn’t like it but he had no choice
Grew up in Locris under the smile
Of a slim respectable stepmother
And murdered her brother
Then it was years of sleeping under bushes
He went north to Phylace then north to Troy
And at last in the ninth year
Death kicked him and he kicked it back
He was close to no one
Like when a donkey walking by a cornfield
Decides to stop