Classic Poem

Now calleth he assembly of the chiefs,
Princes and kings and captains, them whose griefs
To ease his own like treasure had been lent;
Who came and sat at board within the tent
Of him they hailed host-father and their lord
For this adventure, in aught else abhorred
Of all true men. He sits above the rest,
The fox-red Agamemnon, round his crest
The circlet of his kingship over kings,
And at his thigh the sword gold-hilted swings
Which Zeus gave Atreus once; and in his heart
That gnawing doubt which twice had checkt his start
For high emprise, having twice egged him to it,
As stout Odysseus knew who had to rue it.
Beside him Nestor sat, Nestor the old,
White as the winter moon, with logic cold
Instilled, as if the blood in him had fled
And in his veins clear spirit ran instead,
Which made men reasons and not fired their sprites.
And next Idomeneus of countless fights,
Shrewd leader of the Cretans; by his side
Keen-flashing Diomedes in his pride,
The young, the wild in onset, whose war-shrill,
Next after Peleus' son's, held all Troy still,
And stayed the gray crows at their ravelling
Of dead men's bones. Into debate full fling
Went he, adone with tapping of the foot
And drumming on the board. Had but his suit
Been granted--so he said--the war were done
And Troy a name ere full three years had gone:
For as for Helen and her daintiness,
Troy held a mort of women who no less
Than she could pleasure night when work was over
And men came home ready to play the lover;
And in housework would better her. Let Helen
Be laid by Paris, villain, and dead villain--
Dead long ago if he had taken the field
Instead of Menelaus. Then no shield
Had Kypris' golden body been, acquist
With his sword-arm already, near the wrist!
So Diomedes. Next him sat a man
With all his woe to come, the Lokrian
Aias, son of Oïleus, bearded swart,
Pale, with his little eyes, and legs too short
And arms too long, a giant when he sat,
Dwarf else, and in the fight a tiger-cat.
But mark his neighbour, mark him well: to him
Falleth the lot to lay a charge more grim
On woman fair than even Althaia felt
Like lead upon her heartstrings, when she knelt
And blew to flame the brand that held the life
Of her own son; or Procne with the knife,
Who slew and dressed her child to be a meal
To his own father. But this man's thews were steel,
And steely were the nerves about his heart,
As they had need. Mark him, and mark the part
He plays hereafter. Odysseus is his name,
The wily Ithacan, deathless in his fame
And in his substance deathless, since he goes
Immortal forth and back wherever blows
The thunder of thy rhythm, O blind King,
First of the tribe of them with songs to sing,
Fountain of storied music and its end--
For who the poet since who doth not tend
To essay thy leaping measure, or call down
Thy nodded approbation for his crown
And all his wages?
Other chiefs sat there
In order due: as Pyrrhos, very fair
And young, with high bright colour, and the hue
Of evening in his eyes of violet-blue--
Son of Achilles he, and new to war.
Then Antiklos and Teukros, best by far
Of all the bowmen in the host. And last
Menestheus the Athenian dikast,
Who led the folk from Pallas's fair home.
To them spake Menelaus, being come
Into assembly last, and taken in hand
The spokesman's staff: "Ye princes of our land,
Adventurous Achaians, stout of heart,
Good news I bring, that now we may depart
Each to his home and kindred, each to his hearth
And wife and children dear and well-tilled garth,
Contented with the honour he has brought
To me and mine, since I have what we've sought
With bitter pain and loss. Yea, even now
Hath Heré crowned your strife and earned my vow
Made these ten years come harvest, having drawn
The veil from off those eyes than which not dawn
Holds sweeter light nor holier, once they see.
Yea, chieftains, Helen's heart comes back to me;
And fast she watches now hard by the wall
Of the wicked house, and ere the cock shall call
Another morn I have her in my arms
Redeemed for Sparta, pure of Trojan harms,
Whole-hearted and clean-hearted as she came
First, before Paris and his deed of shame
Threatened my house with wreck, and on his own
Have brought no joy. This night, disguised, alone,
I stand within the city, waiting day;
Then when men sleep, all in the shadowless gray,
Robbing the robber, I drop down with her
Over the wall--and lo! the end of the war!"
Thus great of heart and high of heart he spake,
And trembling ceased. Awhile none cared to break
The silence, like unto that breathless hush
That holds a forest ere the great winds rush
Up from the sea-gulf, bringing furious rain
Like mist to drown all nature, blot the plain
In one great sheet of water without form.
So held the chiefs. Then Diomede brake in storm.
Ever the first he was to fling his spear
Into the press of battle; dread his cheer,
Like the long howling of a wolf at eve
Or clamour of the sea-birds when they grieve
And hanker the out-scouring of the net
Hidden behind the darkness and the wet
Of tempest-ridden nights. "Princes," he cried,
"What say ye to this wooer of his bride,
For whom it seems ten nations and their best
Have fought ten years to bring her back to nest?
Is this your meed of honour? Was it for this
You flung forth fortune--to ensure him his?
And he made snug at home, we seek our lands
Barer than we left them, with emptier hands,
And some with fewer members, shed that he
Might fare as soft and trim as formerly!
Not so went I adventuring, good friend;
Not so look I this business to have end:
Nay, but I fight to live, not live to fight,
And so will live by day as thou by night,
Sating my eyes with havoc on this race
Of robbers of the hearth; see their strong place
Brought level with the herbage and the weed,
That where they revelled once shrew-mice may feed,
And moles make palaces, and bats keep house.
And if thou art of spleen so slow to rouse
As quit thy score by thieving from a thief
And leave him scatheless else, thou art no chief
For Tydeus' son, who sees no end of strife
But in his own or in his foeman's life."
So he. Then Pyrrhos spake: "By that great shade
Wherein I stand, which thy false Paris made
Who slew my father, think not so to have done
With Troy and Priam; for Peleides' son
Must slake the sword that cries, and still the ghost
Of him that haunts the ingles of this coast,
Murdered and unacquit while that man's father
Liveth."
Then leapt up two, and both together
Cried, "Give us Troy to sack, give us our fill
Of gold and bronze; give us to burn and kill!"
And Aias said, "Are there no women then
In Troy, but only her? And are we men
Or virgins of Athené?" And the dream
Of her who served that dauntless One made gleam
His shifting eyes, and stretcht his fleshy lips
Behind his beard.
Then stood that prince of ships
And shipmen, great Odysseus; with one hand
He held the staff, with one he took command;
And thus in measured tones, with word intent
Upon the deed, fierce but not vehement,
Drave in his dreadful message. At his sight
Clamour died down, even as the wind at night
Falls and is husht at rising of the moon.
"Ye chieftains of Achaia, not so soon
Is strife of ten years rounded to a close,
Neither so are men seated, friends or foes.
For say thus lightly we renounced the meed
Of our long travail, gave so little heed
To our great dead as find in one man's joy
Full recompense for all we've sunk in Troy--
Wives desolate, children fatherless, lands, gear,
Stock without master, wasting year by year;
Youth past, age creeping on, friends, brothers, sons
Lost in the void, gone where no respite runs
For sorrow, but the darkness covers all--
What name should we bequeath our sons but thrall,
Or what beside a name, who let go by
Ilios the rich for others' usury?
And have the blessed Gods no say in this?
Think you they be won over by a kiss--
Heré the Queen, she, the unwearied aid
Of all our striving, Pallas the war-maid?
Have they not vowed, and will ye scant their hate,
Havoc on Ilios from gate to gate,
And for her towers abasement to the dust?
Behold, O King, lust shall be paid with lust,
And treachery with treachery, and for blood
Blood shall be shed. Therefore let loose the flood
Of our pent passion; break her gates in, raze
The walls of her, cumber her pleasant ways
With dead men; set on havoc, sate with spoil
Men ravening; get corn and wine and oil,
Women to clasp in love, gold, silken things,
Harness of flashing bronze, swords, meed of kings,
Chariots and horses swifter than the wind
Which, coursing Ida, leaves ruin behind
Of snapt tall trees: not faster shall they fall
Than Trojan spears once we are on the wall.
So only shall ye close this agelong strife,
Nor by redemption of a too fair wife,
Now smiling, now averse, now hot, now cold,
O Menelaus, may the tale be told!
Nay, but by slaying of Achilles' slayer,
By the betrayal of the bed-betrayer,
By not withholding from the spoils of war
Men freeborn, nor from them that beaten are
Their rueful wages. Ilios must fall."
He said, and sat, and heard the acclaim of all,
Save of the sons of Atreus, who sat glum,
One flusht, one white as parchment, and both dumb;
One raging to be contraried, one torn
By those two passions wherewith he was born,
The lust for body's ease and lust of gain.
Then slow he rose, Mykenai's king of men,
Gentle his voice to hear. "Laertes' son,"
He said, but 'twas Nestor he looked upon,
The wise old man who sat beside his chair,
Mild now who once, a lion, kept his lair
Untoucht of any, or if e'er he left it,
Left it for prey, and held that when he reft it
From foe, or over friend made stronger claim:
"Laertes' son," the king said, "all men's fame
Reports thee just and fertile in device;
And as the friend of God great is thy price
To us of Argos; for without the Gods
How should we look to trace the limitless roads
That weave a criss-cross 'twixt us and our home?
Go to now, some will stay and other some
Take to the sea-ways, hasty to depart,
Not warfaring as men fare to the mart,
To best a neighbour in some chaffering bout;
But honour is the prize wherefor they go out,
And having that, dishonoured are content
To leave the foe--that is best punishment.
Natheless since men there be, Argives of worth,
Who needs must shed more blood ere they go forth--
As if of blood enough had not been spilt!--
Devise thou with my brother if thou wilt,
Noble Odysseus, seeking how compose
His honour with thy judgment. Well he knows
Thy singleness of heart, deep ponderer,
Lover of a fair wife, and sure of her.
Come, let this be the sum of our debate."
"Content you," Menelaus said, "I wait
Upon thy word, thou fosterling of Zeus."
Then said Odysseus, "Be it as you choose,
Ye sons of Atreus. Then, advised, I say
Let me win into Troy as best I may,
Seek out the lovely lady of our land
And learn of her the watchwords, see how stand
The sentries, how the warders of the gates;
The strength, how much it is; what prize awaits
To crown our long endeavour. These things learned,
Back to the ships I come ere yet are burned
The watch-fires of the night, before the sun
Hath urged his steeds the course they are to run
Out of the golden gateways of the East."
Which all agreed, and Helen's lord not least.