He spread his hands and blessed his mind and all his life: 910
“May you be blessed, my life, the bitter laurel’s brief
and scented garland still upon your snow-white hair!
I kiss your slender ankles and your wounded feet;
how did you ever breach the pass or cross the great
main road, O most tormented life, one-breasted soul? 915
When I was young I held the earth like a huge sphere
nor feared life’s kiss nor quaked before the dreaded gods.
I scorned to feel compassion, my full powers seethed,
I brimmed with poison like the scorpion’s stinging tail,
and like a scorpion I’d have writhed upon my mind’s 920
hot coals had not a small maid come to touch my heart.
Ah, how she calmed my mind, made sweet my lips until
all earthquakes turned to flowers and you and I both fused
till in life’s deep sea-lairs we two were merged in one.
Then my heart’s double-bolted gates swung open wide 925
and a small boy with dappled wings led me through lanes
of colored flowers gently to cool garden plots
within that maiden’s soul, and smiled on me. Dear God,
in just one night my heart had widened with a sweet kiss,
and my stern mind sailed long on strange seductive shores 930
in the deep body’s frigate with a loot of women.
May you be blessed, my life, who passed the heaviest trial
of all and with the light breath of a spring’s cool breeze
knocked down the fortress of my own unpitying ego!
Then slowly as I grew more gentle, I longed to pass 935
even beyond sweet large-eyed Love and in my arms
clasp tight all of my native land like a maid’s body.
O glittering harbors, sand-smooth beaches, tossing boats,
mountains with crystal waters and the pungent thyme,
old crones who spin their wool, maidens with fertile wombs, 940
brave gallant lads who fight the earth or foaming sea,
stones, bodies, souls, how could my mind contain you all?
Then pains for hurts not mine brimmed through my darkened heart
and all the joys of my luxuriant race poured out
as though a dam had burst and drenched my mind completely. 945
The soul’s a thousand times more tasty than good meat,
and like a lion that once has tasted human flesh
and then disdains nor longer wants a humbler prey,
so I, too, wanted nothing less than human souls.
My native land seemed cribbed, for past its shores I felt 950
other bewitching lands and other lean-fleshed souls,
brothers and sisters, myriad forms of joys and sorrows
that stood on their far shores and longed for me to come.
May you be blessed, my life, for you disdained to stay
faithful to but one marriage, like a silly girl; 955
the bread of travel is sweet, and foreign lands are honey;
for a brief moment you rejoiced in each new love,
but stifled soon and bade farewell to each fond lover.
My soul, your voyages have been your native land!
With tears and smiles you’ve climbed and followed faithfully 960
the world’s most fruitful virtue—holy false unfaithfulness!”
The sun had mounted as the archer blessed his life,
and then the pilgrims slowly stretched, rose from the ground,
and dreams took wing like parakeets and flew away.
In the lake’s crystal pool the soaring mountains hung 965
like lofty sunken thoughts, like roses petal-plucked;
the day grew mild, the holy athlete turned serene
till in the mud he dipped ten fingertips with joy
and shaped things tenderly as though he fondled flesh.
Forms briefly rose and gleamed in sun, then once again 970
were plunged in pummeled mud, and other forms took shape.
“The great ascetic has grown meek, for see, his hands
mold monsters now no longer, but only tranquil men!
Take courage, lads, draw near, let’s tell him all our pain.”
Thus did the pilgrims speak to give each other heart, 975
but as the dreadful lone man raised enraptured eyes,
all huddled on the earth once more and shook with fear.
The world-creator cooled himself in the fierce blaze
by raising all trees’ rustling in his memory’s glens:
the oak tree’s mystic murmur and the poplar’s swish, 980
the olive’s downy hush, the pine tree’s whistling whir,
the gallant plane tree’s cooling warbling melody;
he held all foliage in his mind like a green fan
and waved it slowly now to cool his blazing brow.
A maid at length took heart, drew close, and with great fear 985
tied colored rags about his ankle-bone as though
he were a holy tree, to make her prayers come true. 987
She moved her thick and night-kissed lips beseechingly,
but when the ascetic gave no sign of hope, the maid
sank in the bottomless mute wells of his dark eyes. 990
A king took courage then, opened his mouth and cried:
“Pity my people, Father! If the time has come
for you to sink in the earth’s grave, then take our crimes
like a black necklace round your throat to vanish with you.”
The lone man only laughed, then shook his head with wrath; 995
the time had not yet come to sink in earth, for still
he climbed and still the sun stood on his heart’s high peak.
In the sun’s distant icebound realms he saw his bones
wrapped round with seaweed, battered by the frothing waves,
and on his skull a fat black raven perched, the Soul. 1000
Before he’d reach those realms, he’d many a bun to chew!
Then the sun set and the first darkness crushed the earth;
all souls sank down in sleep, the craftsman’s hands grew calm,
and the wheel stopped that shaped, unshaped the forms of men
till ghosts, washed with the dew of night, appeared and danced 1005
in the great threshing floor of the ascetic’s fancy.
It was as though he’d tired of men, thrust them in mud
and longed to pass the hours with his mind’s fantasies,
for his great brain was sated now, and chose with finer care.
At midnight, when the dark mind blooms, Odysseus sat 1010
in moonlight by the wild pear’s root and softly called
on souls alluringly and gave them flesh and bone.
The mystic weaver drifted through the sky and wove,
and in that waning moon’s thin web the phantoms swam
with azure eyes like pale cerulean flowers of night; 1015
mounted on forty waves, the young shore-naiads leapt
till all the enchanted lakeside sighed from rim to rim;
and the black bark of tree trunks cracked and flung with force
the cool green hamadryads with nude feet and breasts:
Almond and Apple-Blossom, Spider-Web, Caresse, 1020
and good Dame Comely, noble source of all the nymphs;
sweet peas and mossy violets sprang wherever they danced.
No one might dare imagine such fresh souls, such limbs
so firm and lean as burst from the black bark of trees.
The nymphs of woods and wilderness all swarmed and smiled: 1025
the twelve prince charmings reared upon their dappled steeds
and laughed and flung the sun for discus all year long;
the brain’s lean vampires and the heart’s dark sea-snakes rose,
br />
the midnight werewolves, wandering ghouls, and donkey-trolls;
it was high time for myths and legends to walk the earth 1030
once more like men and women and warm-blooded beasts.
A forty-footed one-toothed crone spread her thighs wide,
fat grease-drops oozed from her gray hair, her udders hung
brimming with fertile milk that dripped on the moist ground;
as her blue lips uncurled, she waved to the lone man, 1035
and the wind-shepherd smiled and played his dulcet flute;
his airy flocks with their mild silver bells rolled down
from the brain’s crags and the corrals of silent calm,
but still he could not see their black bellwether, God.
He seized the mudballs then and in the heart of night 1040
shaped and reshaped the clay with both his whirling hands;
in the hot night his brains hissed like erotic snakes
and his strong incantations danced on the bare stones
and fell on every house-roof like a cackling rain.
He dug a small pit with his nails, poured his black blood, 1045
then called on the great phantom, God, to loom before him,
and in a thunderous roar and lightning flash God sprang
full-clad in armor, a vain, bearded, swaggering dwarf.
Odysseus laughed and groped the form from head to toe:
“A thousand welcomes to my hearth, O firm-fleshed crab; 1050
I’m hungry, and I like your claws with their lean meat.”
He spoke, then seized God’s chin to crunch the jaws,
and the ghosts shrieked and scattered, all God’s sirens wailed:
“Pity our god, revere him, see how he sweats with fear,
see how his tears and sacred rouge stream down his face!” 1055
The the god-battler stamped upon the earth with rage:
“I’ve no compassion for his sweat or even my soul,
and I disdain all toys, nor do joys lure me. Enough!
I’ve passed beyond the bounds of virtue or of hope.”
He spoke, and God took fright, leapt up, changed many faces, 1060
besmeared himself with paints and soot, turned somersaults,
drew swords and swallowed them, cast ropes in air and climbed,
chewed burning coals, puffed smoke from his flat ears, then twitched
his fat ass like a clown and jigged with bumps and grinds.
But the god-slayer raised his fist in loathing scorn 1065
and God began to bellow like a monstrous bull
who wails with neck outstretched before the butcher’s ax.
A mermaid damned Odysseus with her tear-filled eyes:
“Cursed be the heart of man that knows no reverence,
cursed be his mind that snatches the resplendent veil 1070
to spy his father’s nudeness without fear or shame!”
The ghouls and vampires burst in tears, the Nereids screamed,
for none could bear God’s pain much longer now, but still
ruthless Odysseus mocked and arched his eyebrows taut:
“Oho, look at that bawling babe, that scabby tramp! 1075
He’s all set now to cast his last bait in our hearts,
wandering from town to town, knocking on every door:
‘I’ve come to earth for you alone, for you I starve!
Open your souls and purses, give me alms, take pity!’”
God fell flat on his face and grabbed the mocker’s knees: 1080
“I stoop and bow low to your grace, don’t kill me, son!”
But the god-battler mocked and pricked God ruthlessly:
“You were a brilliant feather once that wildly leapt like a gay spangle on my crown whenever I danced;
but then I set you up as scarecrow in my fields 1085
to fright the wretched mob from nibbling at my grapes,
dressed you in gaudy rags, gave you a rusty ax,
and hung the sun and moon about your chest for charms.
By God, I made you with such craft, such cunning wiles
that for a time, like Orpheus, I was almost fooled! 1090
But I was born in a charmed hour, great freedom’s son,
and raised my fist before you had time to gulp me whole.”
He spoke, then with swift strokes ground God’s face in the dirt.
First he uprooted the gay feathers from God’s crown
who screeched as though he were a peahen plucked alive, 1095
then slowly fleeced him of his charms, his bronze gewgaws,
his false sword-cuts, his necklaces, his crimson rags,
until, stripped bare, God rolled in dirt like a nude hen.
And when God fell to earth, the mind of man leapt up
within his head like a broad-breasted cock, and crowed; 1100
it seemed day broke, sweet light flowed down the mountain slopes
and the god-slayer’s heart grew warm, his black chest opened,
till like a bridegroom with curled locks, smelling of thyme,
he drew the bolts and let the world stroll in his heart.
The nightingale appeared once more, perched on his head 1105
as though the heart were an unruffled bird that sang
with no unsolved enigmas now on green earth’s highest bough.
But as the sage rejoiced in liberty’s light breeze,
a deep voice suddenly filled his breast and cried, “Odysseus!”
and as the appeal resounded and the lake reeds raged, 1110
the phantoms disappeared like crickets or small newts.
The lone man stooped, and in his mind now heard “Odysseus!”
“Dear heart, what dread voice calls me? Answer me, dear heart!”
For the third time the voice rang in his ears—“Odysseus!”
Then the heart-reader knew the voice and spread his arms: 1115
“Great Athlete, with twelve constellations round your loins,
I recognized your harsh and bitter voice, my dear.
O Flame, distilled to pure light from your constant strife, 1118
body that bent like a stout bow and shot your shaft,
the sharpened soul, and with it slashed the world’s frontiers, 1120
Father, it’s you I call both in despair and joy!”1121
The secret voice still struck the ascetic ruthlessly:
“My only son, who strive and search for freedom still,
who quiver like a quartered snake on desert sands,
raise your head high, my dear, recall your gallant youth: 1125
slim as a bow you knelt before my bloodstained knees
with your mind’s quiver flashing full of two-barbed shafts
and looked straight in my eyes and roared unpityingly:
‘I like this old man’s head, it’s full of wine and brains,
I’ll fall in its deep hold and plunder all its loot!’ 1130
I smiled, stooped low and fed you my brains tenderly,
taught you to shoot the bow with skill and cunning craft,
to pass beyond small passions, how to reach the great,
yet search still further, urged by virtue’s stern appeal.
Once, I recall, as I, too, walked through mountain passes, 1135
I saw a small wild blackbird hop at break of day,
perch at the feet of a gray-templed ancient thrush
and listen with his head held high to that old bird;
thus have you too, wild blackbird, looted all my brain!
At times you listened to my counsel like spring rain, 1140
at times my words would split your heart like lightning bolts
until you shook like a nude chick in the air’s clamor.
But I rejoiced in the wild heartbeat of your youth
and thrust you ruthlessly, most cruelly, toward the cliff;
I called on you to choose between two armed camps
there: 1145
one was pitched high on the mind’s peak, all light and flame,
the other was plunged low in dark and muddy flesh,
and then I called on you, my only son, to swear
by your mind’s peak to fight those muddy pits forever
and always’ speak disdainfully to your groveling flesh: 1150
‘My body, do you long to sleep? Then all night long
I’ll keep you upright like pale wax the flames melt down.
To eat? I’ll feed your belly with empty air, like wings.
Tired? Then stand straight on the toes of one foot only
and whirl round like a weathercock on the world’s roof!’ 1155
And you, my brave heart’s wing-clawed son, you seized my words
and swiftly made them deeds, but deeds were not enough,
so that I threw red apple’s virtue further still.
My song rang out like freedom’s savage battlecry
and gods bent down to earth to hear my stern advice: 1160
‘When you have finally trod your flesh and freed yourself,
then split your soul in two armed camps with one sword stroke:
in one the gods shall stand with multicolored rags,
with secret hopes, with virtues that hang like slack dugs;
man’s mind shall whirl in the other like a weather-crow.’ 1165
You rolled your eyes with fear then, I recall, and clung
tight to my knees to keep from plunging down my mind.
I seized you by your arms and cried out bitterly:
‘Man’s mind can never shoot the arrow further still!’
Alas, now that I lie with worms in the cold ground 1170
I cry in anguish to see the greatest task of all.”
Though the god-slayer strained to hear, the groaning stopped,
and then with hands outstretched to earth, he called the dark:
“Grandfather, fling the final task down on my head!”
Then from the other shore the dreadful voice was heard: 1175
“When you have purified your heart of gods and demons,
of virtues great and small, of sorrows and of joys,
and only Death’s great lighthouse stays, the glowing mind,
then rise, my heir, and sternly cleave your mind in two:
below will lie your last great foe, rotten-thighed Hope, 1180
above, the savage Flame, no light, no air, no fire,
scornful and superhuman in man’s hopeless skull.”
He spoke, and like two heavy wings, the entrails closed.
Calmly the lone man shut his eyes to taste, full-slaked,
the silence in his loins that thrust his soul so high 1185