The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel

Raising his small fist boldly in the empty light,

  he cried to the vast sea: “O God, make me a god!” 210

  then waited for reply a moment with clenched fist

  and once again commanded: “God, make me a god!”

  The great sea rose in wrath and rushed to gulp him down

  but he seized stones and pebbles, pelted her with rage,

  until the startled waves turned back and groaned with fear. 215

  For the first time he had touched the world’s three elements;

  now in this hairy aromatic bloom he smelled

  once more the musky odor of sea, woman, and god.

  The heavy wheel of earth turned back and memory rose

  with her large eyes, her white and undulating hair, 220

  till the archer in his entrails felt the suckling child

  sprouting up swiftly in his mind’s reviving breath.

  He drank cool water and turned cool, ate bread and turned

  to bread, a drop of honey made his heart a hive;

  his grandfather gave him mellow wine and his mind turned 225

  to wine vats filled with hairy demons and rank lust.

  His knees and loins grew firm, his cheeks sprang with soft down

  until one dawn he hauled his crimson sail on high,

  a beardless adolescent still, to steal a bride.

  Eggs hatched in every nest till the trees filled with beaks, 230

  hares frisked in the wood clearings, fawns on meadow grass,

  and his wife danced within her husband’s nuptial arms

  till their son came in nine months’ time, and the world glowed.

  But with his son there came one night in his black ship

  that pirateer, grim War, and snatched him to far lands. 235

  The archer’s temples creaked, his lips broke in a smile,

  his voyage darted from the sea’s resplendent bow

  and passed through all the twelve gods like twelve sea-gull isles.

  Ah, how man’s deep unsated entrails ate and ate!

  The grim man-slayer shut his eyes, his temples pulsed, 240

  all things rose in his bowel’s dusky pod once more

  and his head brimmed with joy and rage, seashore and fruit.

  Memories and hopes dashed up like waves, their ebb and flow

  at times drowned his deep entrails and at times exposed

  snakes, scorpions, slimy leeches crawling through their depths. 245

  He flung the fleshly orchid over the plunging cliff

  then tossed his brimming head on high to keep from stifling.

  Shaking with fear at his mud-roots, the lone man cried:

  “I’m not pure, I’m not strong, I cannot love, I’m afraid!

  I’m choked with mud and shame, I fight but fight in vain 250

  with cries and gaudy wings, with voyages and wiles

  to choke that quivering mouth within me that cries ‘Help!’

  A thin, thin crust of laughter, mockery, voices, tears,

  a lying false façade—all this is called Odysseus!

  What shame to build my castle on this fake foundation.” 255

  For solace then, he called his daughter, his fierce cub,

  and when their bold eyes met, two wild beasts reconciled,

  the unmoving archer watched within those yellow orbs

  the dreadful, deep commencement of his mastering mind.

  He watched the first Odysseus on the crust of earth 260

  dash from a cavern’s mouth and rush out toward the sun.

  In his left hand he held a firm high-breasted girl

  and in his right a sharp brain-blooded double ax

  with which he’d killed his fierce grandfather, stolen wives,

  and now was chased by blood-kin, women, men, and dogs, 265

  and ran on, frothing, blood-drenched, through the coiled ravines.

  In the archer’s veins wild memories seethed, he growled and scowled,

  then sped to the high crags, for voices pressed him hard,

  and cruel hates, shameless longings, hissed within his heart.

  “How shall I ever be saved, alas, or raise my head 270

  above these muddy guts so that my soul won’t drown?”

  The seven-souled man wearied as the sun declined

  and sought to set, his eyes grew sweet, and from great hunger

  his entrails hung like blue grape-clusters pecked by birds.

  A spark gleamed opposite his cave in laughing strides, 275

  belle Aphrodite, whom he recognized and hailed,

  his old seductive mistress, welcomed a thousand times.

  Thus with this eye-coquetting star in her black hair

  night came and stood before the lone man’s cavern door,

  and as he raised his eyes toward the sky’s flaming river 280

  he felt himself drowned in that astral cataclysm,

  his heart but a small drop of light that fought the flood

  and swam with stubbornness against the swift night-wandering stream.

  Stretched on his rock, the archer slept like a calm river

  and his outstretched and flaming palms had brimmed with stars. 285

  His bosom leapt like two deep springs, howled like two souls

  as though a man and woman there, the heart and mind,

  were fiercely quarreling like an ancient married couple.

  The suffering man smiled long to hear that wrangling pair

  tearing his bowels apart, plowing his heart in two, 290

  and chirruped like a peasant who yoked his stubborn ox:

  “Push on, lean Gray and Starry Brow, unlock the soil;

  although my farm is small, I’ll fill it full of seed

  that all may eat until they burst, cattle and men!

  Push on till welcome Death comes to unyoke us all!” 295

  Thus did the plowman goad his two most faithful beasts

  in the deep-furrowed and well-seeded fields of sleep,

  but his heart ever fought the yoke and kicked the plow:

  “I’m choking, no frontiers can hold me! I’ll smash the yoke,

  I scorn to plod the threshing floor of patience now 300

  or like the calf be yoked to winnow chaff from wheat;

  beyond firm earth and bread I yearn for the dread abyss!”

  But in its head’s coiled tentacles the sly mind laughed:

  “O poor but haughty heart, for shame! When will you build

  your castle on this earth with gallantry and grace? 305

  You march off as though haunted chaos were far shores,

  as though God were a gaudy bird that flies through air;

  heart, don’t you know that God and cliffs are your own fancies?

  Bend to the yoke, be patient, plow your own fate’s road!”

  But like a vulture the heart screamed and clawed its breast: 310

  “I will not bend to yokes, I smother in your good soil;

  far off, beyond all boundaries, I hear monstrous wings,

  I hear sweet cries and weeping, but a thick wall parts us;

  I want to smash that wall and perish all together!”

  Thus the heart fiercely screamed and seethed in pits of blood 315

  till it was suddenly pierced by a dread outcry: “Help me!”

  The mind like a scared rabbit scurried in its lair,

  but the heart cried with joy, a deep and gaping wound:

  “I pour my blood! Let all dark forebears come and drink!”

  As the heart yelled within the archer’s deep dark cells, 320

  earth’s bowels shook with fright and all the tombstones burst.

  Ah, how the dead rushed up to drink man’s warming blood,

  and the man-slayer shook to watch ancestral ghosts,

  his old and long-lost friends, the shades he once had loved,

  throng round his veins to suck his blood and take new life. 325

  The phantoms howled and dashed
against his breast like waves,

  they grasped and kissed his knees and hung about his loins,

  and the most bold perched on his skull and screeched like hawks:

  “Give us your blood to drink, set us on earth once more

  that we may sip a drop of water, eat sweet bread, 330

  and once more touch a woman’s warming flesh at night!”

  But in his heart’s deep pit he chose with ruthless right

  and thrust the shades aside with his long shepherd’s staff:

  “Plunge down to Tartarus and be damned! Never come back!

  What a hard life you’ve chosen—water, women, bread!” 335

  His father came and mutely stretched his trembling lips,

  but the son thrust him with his heels out of his heart:

  “Father, you’ve earned your holy wages well on earth,

  you’ve lived and shaped a son better than you. Enough!”

  All his ancestral kin rushed up with lapping tongues, 340

  but the bold sentry with his goad plunged them to Hades:

  “Earth has no need of you, the past does not return,

  earth has surpassed the dark grandsire with champing jaws,

  and now it’s shameful to squander your bold grandson’s blood

  to help his ape-forefathers rise from the cold ground.” 345

  But his heart suddenly throbbed, his lion mind grew pale,

  for he saw Captain Clam approach with gasping mouth

  and drag himself to his heart’s pit to drink his blood:

  “Dear Captain Clam!” he cried, and spread his yearning arms;

  the pallid face stared at his friend with a wry smile 350

  and strove to speak but failed, for its throat turned to ash,

  then dragged itself to the heart’s pit to be revived.

  The archer’s eyes then brimmed, but still he raised his staff:

  “Dear friend, the need is great, and there’s but little blood.

  You know how much I love you, but you know it’s vain 355

  to govern this doom-driven, plunging world with love.

  I beg you, Captain Clam, don’t drink my heart’s warm blood,

  for you’ve fulfilled your duty on this earth with honor

  and you’ve no other greater good to give the world.

  Return to the cold ground and let your betters drink!” 360

  He spoke, and quivering Captain Clam grew wan and vanished.

  Then the tormented man sighed long and wiped his eyes;

  his pain was heavy but no tears must dull those eyes

  that watched with ruthlessness and chose among the shades.

  The phantoms scrambled mutely to his forehead’s roots 365

  like black sheep, and his mind with ancient longings swarmed;

  in his excited memory shone old moons and suns,

  poisonous fruits and women, castles, children, steeds,

  rousing good revels and long distant voyages.

  As the tormented man gazed deep in memory’s well, 370

  he suddenly saw a heavy shade on the rim’s edge

  stand mutely with a sword-gash on its bloody skull.

  “Hardihood,” cried the archer in pain, “unlaughing friend,

  have they already seized your crown? Has your sun set?”

  But that rhinoceros, Hardihood, nosed through the soil 375

  and strode to reach the heart and drink a drop of blood

  as though he’d just been slain and still kept all his strength,

  and as he kicked and fiercely thrust the ghosts aside,

  he suddenly staggered back and vanished like a frog in mud.

  But when Odysseus saw his three ancestral Fates, 380

  forty foot high, plunge in his bloody pit with wrath,

  his heart at once gave up its steaming brimming blood.

  Their three tongues lapped and clacked and their throats swelled until,

  drained empty, the pale archer hung above the pit.

  Then Tantalus, that unappeased, unsated soul, 385

  leapt up with lips more pallid, parched and thirsty still:

  “Who set his heart for trap and called my name? I thirst!

  Before I touched it, it went dry and suddenly vanished!

  Thanks for the miserly drop you spilled to heal my heart;

  I see betrayal in your eyes—you want to plunge roots now!” 390

  Odysseus seethed with wrath, opened his mouth to speak,

  but his great forebear shook his head with scornful pride,

  stamped thunderously till earthquakes gaped and gulped him whole.

  Then the Great Athlete rose, but his once massive form

  had been devoured by must and mold to skin and bone, 395

  and plump white worms crawled slowly up his shriveled shanks.

  The archer brimmed with tears to see his great forebear:

  “Heracles, sacred spite, man’s great daemonic soul,

  hard-working man’s clenched fist that pummels ruthlessly

  the tough dough of our flesh to pound it into spirit, 400

  proud grandsire, crowned with twelve great constellations now,

  I thought to see you spring from earth on your black steed

  with Death’s own bloody head swung from your saddle horns,

  but see, your teeth are chattering and your knees show rot,

  for that great octopus, grim Death, has seized and sucked you. 405

  Don’t weep, lean on my own firm flesh, don’t be afraid.”

  Then in the musty air an earth-filled voice replied:

  “Ascetic grandson, you who fight under my shadow,

  archer who’ve strung your own twelve axes row on row,

  see how the worms now crawl on my world-famous body!” 410

  The spoke, then leant on the archer’s arm to keep from falling,

  but when he felt the warming blood course through his veins,

  his bone joints creaked, his bosom swelled, and once again

  the lion’s skull rose high and covered his blond head. 414

  He gazed deep in his comrade’s eyes and hailed him then: 415

  “Grandson, I find you well on earth with your warm fists!

  Ah, if my knees have rotted, the green world is vast

  with flowing water and fresh clay to shape new forms,

  and plenty of sun to dry them, winds to knock them down.

  Forward, don’t brood, my grandson, for all things go well! 420

  I’ve battled both on land and sea, I’ve longed to be

  a deathless god on earth, but my strength broke, and now

  I’ve raised two topless pillars in mid-road for signs 423

  that you may see how far I’ve gone, and go still further.

  The final labor still remains—kneel, aim, and shoot!” 425

  The racked man shuddered to hear his great forefather speak,

  to feel his agitation flooding his own flesh:

  “Grandsire, I thought to see a vast joy light your form, 428

  for, wrapped in flame, you once attained to virtue’s peak, 429

  but now you groan and push me on to newer tasks. 430

  Lord of our race, give me your blessing! What is my task?”

  But the much-wounded form with hopeless grief replied:

  “Ah, I can’t quite make out what the last labor is;

  I feel it glowing mutely in the downy dark;

  at times it seems a gentle god, then a wild beast, 435

  at times a very ancient, thousand-year-old heart.

  Ah, take me with you to the final task of all!”

  He spoke and dashed with yearning in the archer’s arms;

  and as the lone man hugged the shade and clasped but mist,

  he felt his entrails fill and thrash with anguished pain. 440

  The lion’s skull rose high and covered his own head, 441

  old rotting wounds coiled round his flesh like tentacles

>   until he shrieked as both forms joined and merged in one.

  The archer leapt from sleep; the sun had shot up two

  whole spear-lengths in the sky, the world had calmed, 445

  phantoms had scattered in thin air, gates closed once more,

  and memory like a sucking lamia sank and drowned.

  Then the shade-smothered man unloosed the leopard cub’s

  paws lightly from his stifling throat, and deeply breathed,

  for in him battering waves still beat in ebb and flow. 450

  But as the lone man suddenly looked below, he shook

  with fear, for his huge shadow lengthened with a lion’s crown. 452

  Splattered with light, he went from mountain peak to peak,

  a light veil spread in flowers above his burning mind,

  and as numb ghosts unraveled slowly in his heart 455

  Odysseus watched without the slightest fear but joyed

  to feel he carried in his heart’s core that dread race.

  His memory stretched in light, opened its eyes in sun

  (the more that memory’s neck is wrung the more it shouts),

  and those brave deeds and joys his ghosts longed for in vain 460

  woke in their grandson now, made monstrous by such sleep.

  “I’m not left hanging in the sun, hovering in air,

  for deep roots bind me to the earth and my veins climb

  like tangled ivy out of ruins and hug my soul.

  I speak not for myself alone, my mouth is not 465

  a narrow honey-cell where one bee comes and goes,

  but a great beehive where unnumbered workers toil.

  This body which I hold and lug on toward the grave

  is not one body but battalions which for years

  set out from distant shores to plunder the whole world. 470

  My dead now do not lie in earth or rot in grass:

  all are crew comrades in the trireme of my soul!

  ‘Hold the soul well upon the seas!’ my own dead cry,

  ‘Live well that we may live, drink well that we may drink,

  enjoy those girls and towns we’ve not had time to breach; 475

  our blessing, grandson, forward, put an end to passion,

  we’ll kiss with you those lips you kiss, hug those you hug;

  why do you think we’ve shaped you from our heart and blood?

  That you might end what we’ve begun and be the heir

  of passion’s hollow winds to give it flesh and bone! 480

  We are the earth’s deep mother roots, you are the flower!’”

  As all his famished forebears shouted, the archer felt

  them mount from his deep entrails, reach his reeling brain