POET: O Muse, salute
Cloudcuckooland with all that adorns
In hymns and songs.
PEISETAIRUS: Say, where did this thing come from? Who are you,
please?
POET: “I am he from whose lips there drips
The honey of verse. I am page of the Muse,”
In Homer’s verse.
PEISETAIRUS: Page? You mean lackey—you long-haired drip!
POET: “No, not at all, we’re all professors of song:
The Muses’ utterly trusty wards,”
In Homer’s words.
PEISETAIRUS: That’s why your jacket is so measly. . . .
So, Poet, tell me your story.
POET: I’ve long been composing a beautiful song
For your Cloudcuckooland
And many a splendid dithyramb
With virginal chorales and Simonidean odes.524
PEISETAIRUS: And I’ve just begun.
Only moments ago I gave it its name.
POET: “Nimble indeed is the voice of the Muses
Twinkling like the hooves of horses.
Hieron, father and founder of Aetna,525
Establisher of pious order,
By a nod of your head deign to grant me
Whatever boon to you seems seemly.”
PEISETAIRUS: The fellow’s going to be an absolute pest unless we
fob him off with something and make our escape.
[calling to a SERVANT]
Boy, you’ve got a leather jacket and a shirt, so slip
one of them off and give it to our genius poet.
[to the POET]
Here, have this jacket. You seem to be frozen.
POET: “The Muse, my beloved, is never aloof.
She accepts your gift, but deep in your bosom
Ponder this saying of Pindar—”
PEISETAIRUS: We simply can’t shake this wacky stinker off.
POET: “There wandereth among the Scythian hordes
One severed from his people all forlorn.
He hath a leather jacket, yes, but under
That, no woven texture. . . .”
You understand what I’m at?
PEISETAIRUS: I understand you’re out to wangle someone’s shirt.
[to a SERVANT]
Off with that shirt, boy. It’s needed for the poet.
[to the POET]
And off with you.
POET: I go but I’ll be back with a composition
to celebrate your city . . . How about this:
“O Muse, on a golden throne,
Sing of a shivering cold terrain
As I wander the dreary paths
Of a snow-driven plain. . . . Whoopee!”
[Exit POET.]
PEISETAIRUS: [calls after him] Now that you’ve snaffled that shirt you won’t freeze. . . . I’m blowed if I know how he managed to hear of our town so soon. Boy, go round again with the holy water. . . . Silence, please.
[An ORACLEMONGER approaches.]
ORACLEMONGER: That goat there—stop the slaughter.
PEISETAIRUS: And who, pray, are you?
ORACLEMONGER: Me? I’m an oraclemonger.
PEISETAIRUS: Then, beat it!
ORACLEMONGER: You’re a cocky one. Don’t be so irreverent. Cloudcuckooland is actually mentioned by Bacis526 in a prophecy.
PEISETAIRUS: You tell me that now,
after I’ve founded the city!
ORACLEMONGER: A certain scruple made me hesitate.
PEISETAIRUS: All right, go ahead with your litany.
ORACLEMONGER: “Hear thee this:
When the wolf and the grizzled crow527
Make their home together
In the land twixt Sicyon and Corinth—‡
PEISETAIRUS: We’re not on speaking terms with Corinth.
ORACLEMONGER: ’Twas but a metaphor of Bacis for the air.
“And so to Pandora528 sacrifice at once
a ram with pure white fleece.
And he who first is here and unravels my speech,
to him present an unsullied mantle and sandals—a new pair. . . .”
PEISETAIRUS: Does he really mention sandals?
ORACLEMONGER: Take a look in the scroll.
PEISETAIRUS: [opening his own scroll ] Here’s mine,
and yours doesn’t tally with it at all,
and mine comes straight from Apollo. I myself wrote it down.
“Mark ye the fraud that thrusts himself forward,
is naught but a nuisance to those who would sacrifice
and then claims a share of meats from the altar.
Punch him hard in the solar plexus.”
ORACLEMONGER: You’re off your rocker.
PEISETAIRUS: Look at the text, ass! “Give him no quarter, e’en he be an eagle in the skies, or Lampon himself or Diopithes the Great.”529
ORACLEMONGER: Does it really say that?
PEISETAIRUS: Yes, and this:
[whacks him with the scroll ]
Now get the hell out of here.
ORACLEMONGER: Oh my! It’s all over, I fear.
PEISETAIRUS: [as ORACLEMONGER scuttles away] Scram! Monger oracles elsewhere.
[METON, the famous geometer and astronomer, enters wearing buskins and carrying an exaggerated assembly of large surveying instruments.]
METON: I’ve come to see you.
PEISETAIRUS: Oh Lord! Here comes another pest. . . .
So what are you after? What is your quest?
METON: I’ve come to survey the air for you
and partition it into lots.
PEISETAIRUS: Dear God, who on earth are you?
METON: Who am I? Meton, renowned throughout Hellas
and even at Colonus.530
PEISETAIRUS: And what’s all the paraphernalia for?
METON: Air rulers to measure out plots,
because I may as well tell you straight off
that the sky is like the lid of a platter,
and by holding a curved ruler over the top
and using a compass to plot a graph. . . . Do you follow?
PEISETAIRUS: No.
METON: You see, parallel with the ruler I lay a measure
and I’m able to square the circle by putting in a market square
right at the center—
where all the radiating streets meet.
It’s like the way the rays of a star, which is circular,
shine out in all directions.
PEISETAIRUS: The man’s a Thales.531
METON: What is it?
PEISETAIRUS: You know I love you, so do me a favor
and just get on . . . your fucking way.
METON: Why? Are there questions?
PEISETAIRUS: Well, it’s like in Sparta:
foreigners are being booted out, and a lot
of punching and thumping has been going on all over town.
METON: Not a civil war?
PEISETAIRUS: God, no!
METON: What then?
PEISETAIRUS: A unanimous decision to beat the hell out of all phonies.
METON: In that case I’d better go.
PEISETAIRUS: Yes, if it’s not too late. Those rowdies
are getting closer and closer . . . in fact—take that!
[punches him]
METON: Crikey! I quit.
[METON hurries away as PEISETAIRUS shouts after him.]
PEISETAIRUS: Haven’t I been doing my best to tell you
to piss off and go and geomancify yourself?
[An INSPECTOR532 arrives, well-dressed and carrying notebooks, files, and ballot boxes.]
INSPECTOR: Where can I find the consuls?
PEISETAIRUS: Ho ho! Sardanapalus himself!533
INSPECTOR: I’m an inspector assigned to Cloudcuckooland.
PEISETAIRUS: An inspector? Who sent you here?
INSPECTOR: It was some footling idea of Teleas’s.534
PEISETAIRUS: How would you like to leave immediately an
d
go home without more ado and the full fee for your hire?
INSPECTOR: I’d like it a lot. I ought to be at home as it is
addressing the Assembly on the deal with Pharnaces.535
PEISETAIRUS: I’ve got your fee in my hands. You can leave immediately.
Here you are.
[He punches the INSPECTOR.]
INSPECTOR: Hey, what’s that for?
PEISETAIRUS: One from the Assembly for good old Pharnaces.
INSPECTOR: Witnesses, did you see that? An official under attack!
[The INSPECTOR hurries away as PEISETAIRUS calls after him.]
PEISETAIRUS: Scoot, off with you and take your ballot boxes with you. How dare they send inspectors here even before we’ve held the founding service—that’s too damn quick.
[A NEWSAGENT arrives hawking political news for sale. He carries a bunch of leaflets from which he reads from time to time in a barking voice.]
NEWSAGENT: [reading] “. . . and if a Cloudcuckoolander wrongs an Athenian . . .”
PEISETAIRUS: Blimey! What plague is it now? And with literature!
NEWSAGENT: I’m a newsagent selling the latest political news.
PEISETAIRUS: Like what?
NEWSAGENT: The Cloudcuckoolanders shall use
the same weights, measures, and decrees
as do the Olophyxians.536
PEISETAIRUS: And you can find out what a darn fix yer in.
[strikes NEWSAGENT]
NEWSAGENT: Say, what’s got into you?
PEISETAIRUS: Remove yourself and your bloody decrees
or I’ll lambast you with news you wouldn’t choose.
[The NEWSAGENT hurries away as the INSPECTOR returns.]
INSPECTOR: I summon Peisetairus to appear in court
on a charge of assault and battery.
PEISETAIRUS: Do you really? So you’re still hanging about?
[NEWSAGENT reappears, reading from his leaflets.]
NEWSAGENT: “. . . and whosoever shall expel an official
or block his appearance, shall
according to the decree . . .”
PEISETAIRUS: My God, you have reappeared—you as well!
INSPECTOR: I’ll slam you with a ten-thousand-drachma suit.
PEISETAIRUS: And I’ll slam your ballot boxes to pieces.
[INSPECTOR flees.]
NEWSAGENT: Remember when you used to wipe your bottom with
the news?
PEISETAIRUS: Grab him.
[NEWSAGENT flees and PEISETAIRUS shouts after him.]
So you daren’t stay? . . .
All right, let’s go inside and get away
and sacrifice that goat.
[PEISETAIRUS and his SERVANTS go inside.]
STROPHE
CHORUS: And so to me who seest all, Me omnipotent, all powerful, mortals shall Now make holy sacrifice. For I keep watch on all the land Making sure good crops abound, Dealing death to tribes of bugs and lice Whose ever mincing jaws devour Every bud the earth puts forth and every flower, And the fruit of the fruit trees in whose twigs they cower. I am death to those who would annul The fragrance of gardens with chemical Abominations; and with the swipe of my wing, Every critter with a sting I reduce to nothing.
LEADER: The day’s come around again for denouncing enemies:
so a talent for the head of Diagoras of Melos537
for profaning the mysteries; and also a talent
for the rekilling of every dead-and-buried tyrant.
We now announce a special assignment: whoever kills
Philocrates the Sparrow Hawk538 gets a talent
but four talents if you bring him back alive.
Why? Because he strings finches onto reels
and sells them seven for an obol. What’s more,
he pumps thrushes up to make them plump, and tries to
shove
tufts of feathers from blackbirds into their own nostrils.
He catches doves and crams them into cages; later
he ties them to a net and forces them to be decoys.
That is what we intended to deliver.
And if any of you keeps birds in cages in your backyards,
we order you to set them free to their birdy joys;
and if you refuse, you’ll be arrested by the Bird Police
and then you, too, will be used as decoys.
ANTISTROPHE
CHORUS: Happy we, the feathered race of birds:
We need no winter coats, nor in
The suffocating blare of summer
Do we have to roast in long rods
Of burning sun, but loll among
Fluorescent meadows in full flower,
While the cicada, insane with sun, strikes divine
Rhythms, which the noonday heats entwine
Into his song. But in wintertime
I dwell in the hollow of caves and cavort
With the Oreads,539 and in spring
I guzzle on myrtle berries among
Its virginal flowers, or on some fruit
From the Graces’ garden.
LEADER: We’d like to say a word to you judges
about winning the prize, and to spell out
exactly what you’ll get if you vote for us.
It will far excel whatever Paris got.540
Let’s start with every judge’s prime concern—money.
He’ll reap a heap of Laurium541 coins that’ll never dwindle.
On the contrary,
they’ll infiltrate into his home and build nests in his purse,
and hatch out little changelings.
Besides that, you’ll live in a house like a shrine
because it’s roofed with eagle shingle.
And if any of you wants to set up a little office for something
shady,
we’ll supply you with a perky, sharp-taloned falcon secretary.
Should you go out to dine,
we’ll make sure that your crops are nicely lined.
If on the other hand
you vote against us, you had better
cap your pates with plates of copper,
like statues, because let it be understood
that without one of these on, you’ll pay for it
and that white suit you have on will be the target
of our combined birdhood.
[PEISETAIRUS enters.]
PEISETAIRUS: Our sacrifice, dear Birds, went well,
but why, I wonder, has no message come here from the wall
telling us how matters there have gone?
Ah! Here comes someone on the double,
panting like an Olympian runner.
[FIRST MESSENGER runs in.]
FIRST MESSENGER: Wher-wher-where’s, wher-wher-where’s,
wher-wher-where’s Peisetairus the ruler here?
PEISETAIRUS: Right here.
FIRST MESSENGER: Your wall is up.
PEISETAIRUS: Well done!
FIRST MESSENGER: Most impressive, especially the top:
wide enough to allow bigmouthed Proxenides542
to pass Theogenes543 head on—
both on chariots with horses as big as the Wooden One.544
PEISETAIRUS: Holy Heracles, what a feat!
FIRST MESSENGER: And its height—
I measured it myself—one thousand eight hundred feet.
PEISETAIRUS: By Poseidon, that’s tall!
Whoever built so high a wall?
FIRST MESSENGER: The Birds, all by themselves—what’s more
without bird hod carriers from Egypt
or masons or carpenters, but by their own beak and claw . . .
A most amazing sight!
From Libya, thirty thousand cranes sailed in
ballasted with stones for the foundation
and neatly chiseled into shape by the bills of the corncrakes.
Besides that, ten thousand storks brought bricks,
and water was hoisted skywar
ds
by curlews and other river birds.
PEISETAIRUS: Who brought them cement?
FIRST MESSENGER: Herons, in hods.
PEISETAIRUS: But how did they get the cement into the hods?
FIRST MESSENGER: That, pal, was sheer genius: the geese
dug their great webbed feet under it and off it went,
shoveled straight into the herons’ hods.
PEISETAIRUS: As they say: “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”
FIRST MESSENGER: And d’you know, there were belted bricklaying
ducks
and juvenile swallows with tails like trowels
with clay in their beaks.
PEISETAIRUS: With all that help, what workmen need be hired? . . . What else was there? Who did the woodwork for the walls?
FIRST MESSENGER: Woodpeckers, the most skilled of carpenters,
drilled the gateposts with their bills.
The hammering of all the pecking we heard
made the place sound like a shipyard.
But now the gates are up, bolted, and barred.
All is securely garrisoned;
the patrols are out, and on the walls are watchmen with bells.
Sentries are posted everywhere
and beacon signals ready on the towers.
Now I’m off to have a bath. The rest is all yours.
[FIRST MESSENGER leaves.]
LEADER: [gazing searchingly at PEISETAIRUS]