all that was
later.
“The wind grew stronger, bringing up clouds;
harsh sea-waves
hammered at the Argo, slammed at our gunwales till
the magic beams
of Athena’s ship were howling in fury at Poseidon.
Orpheus
played, but the sea wouldn’t hear. Then Idmon, younger
of the seers,
stood up, wild-eyed, and clinging to the mast, he yelled
out, ‘Listen!’
We listened, and heard … God only knows. But as if
in a dream
I saw a hand six paces broad rise un from the water and grasp the Argo’s side, and the ship was still as a
stone
despite the terrible wind, the churning, pitch-dark waves. Then a voice heavier than thunder said: ‘Hear me,
Argonauts!
How dare ye, in proud defiance of Almighty Zeus, purpose to carry fierce Herakles to Kolchis? His fate assigns him Argos, where he’s doomed to serve
Eurystheus,
accomplishing for him twelve great tasks; and if, in the
few
remaining, he happens to prevail, he shall go back to
Zeus, his father.
Forget regret. As for Polyphemon, it is his fate that he found a famous city among the Mysians, where
the Kios
disembogues to the sea. He will die, when the gods see
fit.
far from his home, in the broad land of the Khalybes. As for Hylas, a nymph has taken him — too much in love to ask permission of the bold and glorious Argonauts.’ So he spoke. The thunderheads rumbled as if in a laugh.
The huge hand
sank. Dark water swirled around us, broke into foam, tumbled past rails and coamings and hurled us on.
‘Then Telamon
came to me, weeping, and clutched my hand and kissed
it, saying:
‘Forgive me, lord. Do not be angry if in a foolish moment I was blinded by love for dear friends lost. The
immortal gods
know best, I hope. As for my offense, may it blow away with the wind, and let us two, who have always been
friends, be friends
again.’
“I said nothing for a long time, the god’s laughter— soft and dangerous as thunder on the open sea—
still ringing
in my ears. It seemed that only I, of all the Argonauts, or only Idas and I (I saw the madman’s eyes), fully understood that our grand mission was insanity— and Akastos, perhaps, my cousin, Pelias’ son. (He sat, thin arms folded, staring full of sorrow at the grinding
sea.)
It seemed to me that we alone had grasped the message of the voice that came from the storm: Love truth,
love loyalty
so far as it suits our convenience. I’d lose still more of
them.
Such was the prophecy of the seers on the day we’d
left. I’d watch them,
one by one, drift off, slip past recall. And if
I told them now it was all a mistake — those glory-seekers gathered from all Akhaia (Telamon’s brother Peleus, waving proudly to his son, brought down to see us off by Kheiron’s wife, old Kheiron beaming, waving his two huge arms; Hylas, beaming at his hero; Herakles rowing, the muscles of his face like knots) … But I was still
their captain,
the one will that resolves the many, even when the many are mad. Sense may emerge at last, in human labors, or may not. Meanwhile, there must be order, faith in
the mission;
otherwise, deadly absurdity. I couldn’t afford mere humanness, the comfort of admitting confusion.
I would
lose more that way. The eternal gods can afford whimsy. Not us. Not I, as captain.
“I got control and said:
‘Good Telamon, you did indeed insult me grievously when you accused me, here before all these men, of
wronging a loyal
friend. They cut to the quick, those heartless words of
yours.
But I don’t mean to nurse a grudge against you. It was
not some flock
of sheep, some passel of worldly goods you were
quarrelling about,
but a man, a beloved comrade of your own. I like to
think
if occasion arose you’d stand for me against all other
men
as boldly as you did for him.’ Then, not too hastily, like a man setting his rankling wrath aside, I embraced
him.
He wept fiercely, like the child he was. And I too wept, moved by the childlike heart in that towering warlord.
Orpheus
studied his golden instrument, knowing my mind too
well.
“I learned later that all turned out in Mysia exactly as the voice in the storm foretold. Polyphemon built
his city;
Herakles resumed the labors he’d dropped in haste at
the gates
of Mykenai — but before he left, he threatened to lay all Mysia waste if the people failed to discover for him what had become of poor Hylas, alive or dead. The
Mysians
gave him the finest of their eldest sons as blood-bond
hostages
and swore they’d continue the search.
“So much for the steadfast faith
of Herakles.
“All that day, through the following night,
gale winds carried us on. When the time for daybreak
came
there was no light. The wind died suddenly, as if at a
sign
from Zeus. The sky went green. There was hardly air
enough
to breathe. No man on board had the strength to row.
We sat,
soaking in sweat, praying to all the gods we knew. There were voices — sounds from the flat sea, from
passing birds,
the greenness above us: Where’s Herakles? Where’s
Hylas? We started,
prayed with our parched lips to the sixteen powers of
the sea.
It was unjust — insane. ‘What do they want of us?’
I asked the seers.
‘Where’s Herakles? Where’s Hylas?’ they said, but in
voices not
their own. We waited — how many days I couldn’t say. My cousin Akastos sat at my side, on watch, as if to guard me from some grim foe outside, though he
knew pretty well,
like Idas, like Phlias with his hand on my shoulder,
where my enemy lurked.
“In that senseless calm, Orpheus remembered
Dionysos: sang
how Zeus once put on his darker form, the dragon shape of Zeus Katachthonios, called Hades, whom he himself
expelled
from heaven, and went in that evil form to the shadow
of Hera,
the serpent Demeter, deep in the earth, whom Hera
hated
and who was Hera, though both of them had forgotten.
In her
he planted Persephone, later his Underworld queen,
by whom
Hades-Zeus had his son Dionysos, who was born
many times,
always unlucky. At times he was torn apart by Titans, at times by animals, at times by women gone crazy
with wine
and lust. Once, leading virgins on a violent, drunken
hunt,
he captured his quarry and, tearing it apart alive,
discovered
in amazement and terror that the beast had a dark
human face and horns,
that is, it was himself. It was he who invented wine, crown of his father’s creation — Dionysos’ glory, and
his ruin.
“Like Dionysos, the founder of Thebes was midnight
black;
his queen was white as snow. Because their marriage
was perfect,