deep trenches grooved it, and its flaming cheeks: were gripped
with torturous arms as by a savage octopus;
it bit its thin lips hopelessly to keep from howling.
Above it shone serenely the last head but one, 615
and steadfast weighed all things, beyond all joy or grief,
like an all-holy, peaceful, full-fed, buoyant spirit.
It gazed on Tartarus and the sky, a slight smile bloomed
like the sun’s subtle afterglow on faded lips;
it sauntered on the highest creviced peaks of air’ 620
where all things seem but passing dream and dappled mist;
and from its balding crown, that shone like a smooth stone
battered by many flooding seas and licked by cares,
there leapt up like unmoving flame the final head,
as though it were a crimson thread that strung the heads 625
like amber beads in rows and hung them high in air.
The final head shone, crystal-clear, translucent, light,
and had no ears or eyes, no nostrils, mouth, or brow,
for all its flesh had turned to soul, and soul to air!
Odysseus fondled all the demon’s seven souls 630
as he had never fondled woman, son, or native land.
“Ah, my dear God, if only my dark soul could mount
the seven stories step by step and fade in flame,
but I’m devoured by beasts and filled with mud and brain!”
The wily peddler smiled in secret satisfaction, 635
feeling his dangling hooks had caught the octopus,
and then Odysseus filled the peddler’s hands with gold:
“O cunning fisherman, you snare the mind with skill;
here, fill your itching palms with gold, heal my desire,
give me that seven-headed demon, that bright robe.” 640
The greedy palms sprang open and devoured the gold,
and then the roguish stranger caught the crystal hand
of the world-famous lady, stooped, and scanned her palm:
“My grandsire, a great sorcerer, could read the fates;
they say his hollow shoulders held two monstrous heads; 645
the one, with eyes wide open, could expound the past,
the other, blind, could scrutinize the foggy future,
and his great power still reigns within his grandson, Lady.”
He studied then her rosy palm and spoke with awe:
“O godly woman, stars and swords flash in your hands! 650
I see a mountain-heap of bodies and red streams
amid deep gardens of thick smoke and blind canaries.”
He spoke, then vanished like a snake in the town’s streets.
The archer covered Helen’s quivering shoulders gently
with the resplendent gold-stitched robe so that it gleamed 655
on her seductive back with waters, steeds, and kings;
and as the proud stag leaps with lighting on the doe
so did the impetuous archer seize her by the waist:
“You hold the scales of Fate deep in your bosom’s cleft,
and if it’s true that you’re ordained to burn the palace, 660
I ask this boon: grant me for wage and recompense
a small, small pointed ship on which to flee one dawn.”
Then hurriedly he unclasped that man-bewitching waist
and his slight smile’s reflection vanished from his brow:
“Lady, it’s time we climbed to the bull-fighting castle; 665
our words were playthings of the brain and the wind’s whistle.”
The comrades from their rambles had returned replete,
and when the archer marshaled them, he gave commands:
“Helen and I today shall mount to the king’s court;
he’s an old comrade, strong in war, and when he sees 670
and touches Helen, his thin backbone will rejoice.
But you must calk our battered ship with skill and strength,
arm it with sails and rigging, spread it with thick grease,
for when God comes to snatch our tiller, he swoops swiftly.
Kentaur, take care, don’t fall to wine and kisses now, 675
for lads, at any moment we may need our souls,
so keep them far from wine and women, safe and sober.
I speak to all, and not to Kentaur only, friends,
so hang my words like earrings from attentive ears.
But Hardihood, you’ll come with me; who knows what work 680
a bronzesmith’s sooty hands may find in palace walls?
My breast’s a buzzing beehive of unruly bees,
and I don’t know as yet just when the bees will swarm;
all have unsheathed their sting, but hold their honey still.
Nor enmity nor friendship pulls me toward the castle; 685
my vacillating spirit is armed to right and left
for a sweet friendly feast or the red sword of war.
Whatever that holy pair begets—fate and man’s mind—
is welcome! We’ll unswaddle it with ready hands!
Bronzesmith, push on, the anvil yearns for the hammer’s stroke!” 690
Rocky grew sullen then and flung out, bold and rash:
“We, too, have souls and strength—not that you seem to care!”
He spoke, then suddenly felt ashamed and dropped his eyes.
The archer sank his hands in his friend’s curly locks:
“Don’t rush yourself, green lad! I won’t forget! I know 695
quite well your soul’s prepared and chafes to take its turn.”
But as he spoke and stroked with love the warm gnarled head,
a dark thought struck him: the black earth—may it be cursed!—
would one day gape and swallow whole this brawny man!
He felt like shrieking out a great blaspheming curse 700
but held his blind wish back and swallowed his wild wrath:
“Rocky, don’t hold a grudge against me, don’t be vexed,
I swear to throw your way one day the heaviest mortal duty.”
Thus the three friends of fate, their destiny unknown,
on a huge heavy ox-cart climbed the palace road 705
and the day gleamed and glittered like a bright bronze cow.
A sweet breeze rose to cool the earth at afterglow,
olive trees swelled with wind, and the admired light
rose stone by stone on the green mountain slopes, and faded.
A girl stood in the vineyards all alone and sighed 710
as all the vine-leaves round her withered with her pain
till the compassionate man felt deeply the girl’s ache:
“Helen, earth sighs, it seems to me, and my heart breaks.”
But Helen smiled at man’s fantastic lunacies:
“Ah, lover of the bow, don’t grieve; it was not earth 715
but some green girl who smelled man pass, and her loins flamed.”
The knowing man laughed wryly but did not reply;
there was but one short phallic bridge between the sexes,
and then deep Chaos where even a bird’s wing might not pass,
for man’s soul perched, an eagle’s nest, high in the head, 720
and woman’s soul lay brooding deep between two breasts.
The silent archer tasted thus dusk’s bitterness
while all of Mother Earth’s serene, sad tenderness,
the mountains round, vineyards and trees, were drowned in light,
as though Odysseus gazed on ruins in deep water, 725
a swordfish sailing in the sea’s dark azure depths.
A swarming crowd climbed slowly the white palace road,
all who had vowed this pilgrimage, and tightly clutched
clay miniatures of poppies, pigeons, calves and hearts,
their humble gifts to the dread Mother of men and
beasts; 730
and the sea-chested pilgrim climbed with the great crowd
to proffer Helen to the myriad-breasted goddess.
He listened to his sparse-haired cunning wagoner
who, starved for talk, unfolded to the smith the shames
of their old king, the secrets of their holy rites: 735
“He shall return renewed today from the high mountains,
and next day bulls shall dance within the ritual ring
like wedding guests who bring the bridegroom to the bride.”
Then the ox-driver laughed and winked his eyes with craft:
“In the ring stands the bride, a hollow cow of bronze, 740
on which the Bull-King swoops until both merge in lust.
Don’t let them fool you, friend, for here’s the mystic secret:
in the bronze belly of the cow a real girl lies!”
The driver’s flickering tongue wagged on, and his eyes sparkled:
“And yet, my friend, take lightly what I’ll tell you now: 745
our doomed king lusts to take for bride his virgin daughter!
In all the caves he’s set loose bands of wild-game hunters,
for Krino, still unmounted, hates all mortal men.
Alas, though born of dragon seed, she’ll not escape.”
The beardless driver laughed and goaded his dull oxen, 750
but the hunched, silent bronzesmith felt his heart leap up
like a dark beast who hears a rustling in the leaves.
The dark blue twilight spread on the respiring soil,
fuzz-breasted insects fell embraced on lily leaves,
and when a shepherd rose and leant on his lean stick, 755
the mountain slopes swayed with the sound of silver bells.
Then the arch-eyebrowed lady longed for cooling water.
Within a garden of plump water-nourished leaves
a blond-haired gardener turned his chain-pump like a horse
until the buckets overbrimmed with gurgling sound; 760
there tall sunflowers shone like princes by stone walls
and marigold and balsam filled the dusk with scent.
When the cart stopped, Odysseus gave his sharp command,
and the tall gardener seized a bowl, brimmed it with water,
and proffered it on muddy knees to the arch-eyed lady. 765
Her rose-red palms refreshed, her godly throat grew cool,
her veins swelled and rejoiced as though a man passed through them
till the sun-bearded gardener steamed with joy to gaze
on the tall-throated beauty sipping like a bird,
and her alluring glances struck him like the sun’s rays. 770
The archer glowered to see how her nostalgic eyes,
smothered with passion, loitered on the young man’s chest,
and he was suddenly seized with wrath and clenched his fists:
“Drive on! Night falls, and little time hangs in the scales!”
They moved on, but her soul still lingered on the road. 775
Just as an eagle hunts the misty fields for hare,
the castle-wrecker’s mind gazed on his muddy entrails:
“You driveler, when will you stop groaning, muddy guts?
And you, wolf-dancing heart, when will you ever find rest?”
The fertile-minded man thus scolded his dark roots. 780
A bull growled deep in earth, and the ox-driver stopped:
“O master, raise your hands on high, open your eyes,
for the great palace soon will suddenly come to view.”
Then the world-rambler deeply felt his chest swell up:
“Life is a hunt, we dash with arrows at early dawn, 785
and God, how many pheasants and slim deer to kill,
how many trysting-places on the crinkly grass!
O keep your gut-string taut, dear bow, do not snap now!”
He turned and reared his neck high like a greedy snake,
then opened his eyes wide to catch the lightning flash, 790
His temples creaked, rejoiced and all the city spilled
like gurgling wine and cooled him to his thirsty guts: ‘
bronze columns, towers, gardens, gods, men, terraces
enriched his white-haired mind, till like a partridge cloth
the wealthy, gaudy town swayed in the darkling: air 795
until his deep unsated brain with satiation smiled.
A high joy seized their minds, their bones felt light as air,
and as they slowly climbed the palace’s long stairs
they felt their shoulders sprout with downy, curly wings.
The lone man turned to admire the famed decoy of men 800
as step by step she breached the palace like a flame.
It was just such an hour as this when the bright star
of the nude wagtail goddess laughed, shadows embraced,
as by Troy’s battlements he’d placed the pregnant mare;
the azure darkness dimly shone like this when once 805
he stood, new-washed and mute on his ancestral threshold,
and held the wages of just slaughter in firm hands.
Odysseus moved his lips and hailed the coming night:
“O dark-eyed lady, this is a pure and lucky hour.”
In dusk the crowd shone faintly in the central court, 810
and from the terrace of the women’s quarter stooped
bare-breasted, golden-feathered ladies, budded flowers,
and laughed with wonder at earth’s multicolored ants.
The Serpent Sisters, consecrated maids who served
the many-dugged old dame of earth, in joy adorned 815
the squat round columns with white lilies and green palms,
and decked the king’s courts to receive the miracle.
But suddenly as the inner gate swung wide, there loomed
three monstrous-bodied Negroes with thick brazen spears;
between their savage thighs two slender leopards slunk. 820
Then a wasp-waisted Cretan sniggered to the bronzesmith:
“All joy to these black lovers of lush Diktena!
Evil tongues say that our good-natured princess now
cries out in bed with these three blacks the whole night through.”
He was still speaking when the gold jambs shone like stars; 825
Diktena’s soft and tender body stood revealed
and her breasts swayed like two newborn and curly beasts.
She slowly lifted heavy-lidded, painted eyes,
harrowed the courtyards, the men’s bodies, festive dames,
then smiled and slowly vanished in the night once more. 830
Arch-eyebrowed Helen sank her face in her cupped hands:
“My eyes are tired of gazing and my ears of hearing.
Ah God, to lie down in a nook till the world cools!”
The archer’s heart then ached for that celestial body:
“Helen, I’ll tell the guards of our renowned descent; 835
the gates shall open then, you’ll lie on golden beds,
for our renown has surely reached these distant shores.”
He spoke, pushed through the milling crowd, and vanished soon.
Hardihood, meanwhile, gaped with silent envious awe
on adamant embellished armor highly wrought 840
with rampant rushing lions, lilies in full bloom,
and girls that played and tumbled with ferocious bulls:
you’d think that each sword cried with its own special pain.
The Evening Star had vanished in the sea like flame,
and honeysuckle, tangled in the hair of night, 845
burst, till the curled locks in the courtyards smelled of musk,
And Helen, leaning on a sea-blue column, watched
the pert court ladies with their flouncing furbelows
who bent and wriggled their wide loins with swaggering sways
and kept the double treasure of their bosoms open, 850
Deep in her mind, the crystal-breasted woman scolded:
“It’s best that women keep their breasts well hidden, clothed,
to veil them like wild flames and so preserve their strength;
that which you wish to give, keep hidden and unspent.”
Then as all-knowing Helen appraised the women’s armor, 855
and saw with sidelong glance the blond-haired gardener come
and stand beside her like a chaste and guileless bull,
naked, with but a sheepskin round his sunburnt loins,
she looked on his strong sturdy knees with stooped submission.
The snow-white swan-god suddenly passed through her dazed mind, 860
he who had swooped and cast her mother supine on grass,
and now, dear God, he’d come again to seek her out
with wine-drenched beard, mud-splattered feet, and heavy flesh!
Thus, stooped, she felt his panting stallion breath above her
entering her brimming neck and coursing down to her loins 865
until she felt the old sweet dread that seized her mother.
He reached his calloused hand in silence, filled her palm
with a grape-cluster, his first fruit, huge as an infant,
and then the swan-born heard his steps withdraw, and sighed
with soft desire as she watched his firm calves vanish, 870
She raised her head and ate with greed the luscious grapes;
three-headed time was conquered: in one lightning flash
loam, grapes, and wine had merged, intoxication spread
like a tall vine and twined about her famous thighs.
And thus the lone man found her, sunk in hidden thought, 875
the bittersweet grape-cluster in her rose palms still.
He saw her eyes brim sweetly with a blond-haired man
and mocked her gently as he spoke with slant allusion:
“Lady, good weather at your prow, wind in your sails!
You’re scudding swiftly on deep seas to distant shores!” 880
He laughed without much heart, then with great anger said:
“Tonight we three must lie here in a courtyard nook
and sleep with the remaining pilgrims till day dawns,
but when the king finds out tomorrow who we are
well enter his great palace as befits our rank.” 885
The bulldog bronzesmith then appeared with sullen glance
and all three lay amid the columns on myrtle boughs.
The people swarmed about them, and the stars dripped dew,
the women tucked their rich-embroidered wings like birds,
girls giggled in the shade, the young men strolled and swaggered, 890
The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel Page 29