It’s not by choice I’m held here; I must have offended
undying Gods who rule broadly in heaven.
Tell me yourself—you Gods know everything surely—
which of the deathless Gods has stopped and constrained me?
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How can I travel the fish-filled sea and return home?’
Ensnaring a Sea-Lord
“The glowing Goddess answered me soon as I’d spoken.
‘Well then, stranger, I’ll tell you. I’ll speak to you plainly.
A sea-lord comes this way, an errorless old man,
Proteus of Egypt, deathless and knowing the deepest
ocean waters. He serves under Poseidon.
He gave me birth, I’m told: that lord is my father.
If you could hide somehow, surprise him and hold him,
he’d tell you your course, how hard and far is your voyage,
how you can travel the fish-filled sea on your way home.
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He’ll also tell you, Zeus-bred man, if you want it,
whatever right or wrong was done in your great hall.
You’ve been away, traveling hard for a long time.’
A God Can Be Hard to Catch
“She spoke that way but I quickly answered by saying,
‘Show me yourself, right now, some trap for the old God,
lest he spot me first and somehow avoid me.
It’s hard for an earth-bound man to master a great God.’
“I stopped and the shining Goddess answered me promptly:
‘Well then, stranger, I’ll tell you. I’ll speak to you plainly.
At noon when the Sun-God arches halfway through heaven,
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my lord arrives from the sea. An errorless old man,
he’ll hide in some dark rollers under the Westwind
and move forward to look for rest in a hollow cavern.
Seals around him, the graceful sea-daughter’s children,
rise from the gray waters to sleep there together.
Their breath is foul from all the depths of the ocean.
I’ll marshal you there myself at the showing of Dawn’s light.
I’ll lay you down in the right way. Choose your companions
very well—three men from your strong-timbered vessels.
Sleeping among the Seals
‘But first I’ll tell you all the wiles of the old man.
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He’ll count the seals right off, moving among them.
He tallies them all by fives, watching them closely,
then he lies in their midst—like shepherd and sheep-flock.
Soon as you know for sure he’s fallen asleep there,
you must really be forceful, look to your power,
hold him tight! He’ll push and struggle to break free,
testing you every way. He’ll look like a creature
that crawls the earth, like water or marvelous firelight.
Hold on still more tightly—all of you grip him.
‘In time he’ll speak for himself, asking you questions,
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taking again the shape you saw when he lay down.
Then you may loosen your forceful grip on the old man,
my strong war-chief. Ask him which God is against you
and how you can travel the fish-filled sea on your way home.’
I walked to the ships myself where they stood on the beach-sand,
my heart mulling plenty of hope as I walked on.
Soon as I came back down to the ships and the salt sea
we all made dinner. Ambrosial night was arriving:
we went to sleep right there on the shore of the salt sea.
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Hiding under the Skin
“When newborn Dawn came on with her rose-fingered daylight,
I walked along the shore, the sea with its wide ways,
and prayed to the Gods often. Friends were behind me:
I’d brought three men I trusted most in a challenge.
The Goddess, meanwhile, diving under the broadly
breasted sea, hauled up skins: four seals from the water,
newly flayed. She planned a ruse on her father.
Having scooped out beds of sand by the water
she sat to wait. We went quite close to her promptly.
She made us lie down and threw a hide over each man.
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Killing the Smell
“What a revolting trap! The stench from the sea-fed
skins of seals was all that shocking and sickly—
who’d ever lie and sleep right next to a sea-beast?
The Goddess herself saved us, finding a great help:
she brought ambrosia, placing it under our noses.
A joy to inhale, it killed the stench of the sea-beasts.
All that morning we waited with spirits that bore up.
Struggle with the Sea-Lord
“Then seals came out of the sea, crowding together.
They soon were lying in rows at rest on the beach-sand.
At noon the old one came from the sea. Spotting his well-fed
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seals he marshaled them all, checking their number,
counting us first with the beasts. Never suspecting
guile was there, he lay himself on the beach-sand.
“We charged and shouted, throwing our arms around him.
The old man never forgot his crafty disguises:
he took the shape of a lion first with a full mane,
then a snake, a panther next, and a large boar.
He took on the flow of water, a tree with its high leaves.
We held on tightly ourselves, our hearts unrelenting.
The Lord of the Sea Will Help
“At last the old one tired of painful disguises.
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Yes and he actually spoke out, asking me questions:
‘What God, son of Atreus, helped with your ambush,
holding me against my will? What is your great need?’
“He spoke that way and I promptly answered by saying,
‘You know, old man. Why do you question and fool me?
I’m kept so long on this island. I cannot discover
an end to it all and the heart’s wasting inside me.
Tell me yourself—you Gods know everything surely—
which of the deathless Gods has stopped and constrained me?
How can I travel the fish-filled sea on my way home?’
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“I spoke that way and the old one answered me quickly,
the right victims before embarking in order
to sail home fast on the wine-dark sea to your homeland.
Your portion now is not to look on your loved ones,
not to enter that well-built house in your homeland
before you sail once more to the waters of Egypt,
that Zeus-fed river. Offer sacred hecatombs duly
to deathless Powers who rule broadly in heaven.
Then the Gods will give you the voyage you long for.’
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What Happened to All the Akhaians?
“He spoke that way and all my spirits were broken.
That lord had told me to sail again on the hazy
sea toward Egypt—a long and wearying journey.
Even so I finally gave him an answer.
‘I’ll do it that way, old man, just as you told me.
But tell me something else, answer me truly:
were all the Akhaian ships unharmed when they came home?
The war-chiefs we left, Nestor and I, sailing from Trojan
shores: did they die a hateful death in their warships?
Or after the war wound up, in the arms of their loved ones?’
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“I spoke that way and the old one answered me quickly,
‘Son of Atreus, why ask this? Surely you need not
know and be taught my mind. You won’t be a tearless
man for long, I’m sure, if you hear out the whole tale.
So many were slain back there, so many abandoned.
Odysseus May Be Alive Still
♦ ‘Only two of the bronze-coated Akhaian leaders
were lost on the way home—you’d stayed at the fighting—
and one may still be alive, held back on the broad sea.
The Doom of Aias
‘But Aias went down, his long-oared vessels around him.
Poseidon had brought him close at first to the massive
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rocks at Gurai—he’d saved him there from a wild surf.
He might have raced from his doom in spite of Athene’s
wrath but he tossed off prideful words, grand in his folly,
claiming in spite of the Gods he’d fled from the great sea.
Poseidon heard it all, that boisterous yelling.
Swiftly his powerful hand grappled the trident,
smashing the Gurai rocks and breaking a crag off.
One part stayed but a huge part fell in the water
where Aias had just been sitting, grand in his folly.
It dragged him down under the swirling and endless
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water. The man was lost, swallowing salt sea.
The Murder of Agamemnon
‘Your brother? He fled in his hollow ship to avoid doom,
saved from seas I suppose by the queenly Here.
But then, about to arrive at the sheer heights of Maleia,
high winds caught him and took him away to a fish-filled
sea where he groaned heavily, borne on that water,
pushed to a far land’s end, the home of Thuestes
before but now of Aigisthos, son of Thuestes.
‘Now the way back home appeared to be harmless.
Gods gave him a change of wind and he came home.
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What joy to disembark in the land of his fathers!
He touched and kissed the soil, plenty of warm tears
flowed from his eyes, he welcomed and gazed at the country.
‘A lookout had watched from the rocks. Sneaking Aigisthos
had brought and sat him there; he’d promised to pay him
two gold talents. The man had watched for a whole year
lest Agamemnon get by unspotted and call back
the rush of his prowess. When word came to the palace
that shepherd of people, Aigisthos, was fast with his tricky
plans: choosing twenty men, the best in the country,
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to wait in the trap, he ordered a feast to be ready
and went to call on Agamemnon, a shepherd of people,
with horses and chariot. What he planned was revolting:
hardly thinking of death, Agamemnon was brought there
and killed at the feast like cattle killed in their own stall.
No one was left. Agamemnon’s followers died there.
Aigisthos’s henchmen too were all killed in the great hall.’
Death-Feast
“Those were his words. All my spirits were broken.
I sat on the sand and wept. Wanting to live on,
to see the sunlight, left my heart for a long time.
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But after I had enough of crying and clawing,
the lord of the sea told me, that errorless old man:
‘Son of Atreus, don’t cry nonstop for so long now.
We find no help in wailing. Instead you should labor
fast as you can to sail to the land of your fathers.
You’ll find that killer alive, or Orestes will kill him
before you’re there—and you’ll take part in the death-feast.’
Odysseus and Kalupso
“Soon as he’d spoken the heart and spirits inside me
were bold and warm again. In spite of my anguish
I spoke to that lord and my words had a feathery swiftness:
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♦ ‘So now I know of those men. But name me the third man,
whether alive and kept out there on the broad sea
now or dead. I want to hear, in spite of my anguish.’
“I spoke that way and the old one answered me promptly,
‘The son of Laertes. An Ithakan household was once home.
I saw him shedding warm tears on an island,
kept in a Nymph’s hall: Kalupso has forced him
to stay and he can’t get back to the land of his fathers
lacking a ship with oars, lacking the crewmen
to send him over the broad back of the salt sea.
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The Last Days of Menelaos
‘You now, Zeus-bred Menelaos, the Gods don’t
say you’ll die facing your doom in horse-feeding Argos.
♦ No, the deathless Gods will send you down to Elusian
Fields at the earth’s far end with blond Rhadamanthus.
The lives of men down there are surpassingly easy.