to use. I frowned and steeled myself for the necessary dullness, and, sighing, taking him gently to task, I said:
“ ‘Tiphys, why do you comfort me? I was a blind fool, and the error’s fatal. When Pelias ordered me out on
this mission
I should have refused at once, even though he’d have
torn me limb
from limb. It was selfish madness which even in selfish
terms
has turned out all to the bad. Here I am, responsible for all your lives — and no man living less fit for it! I’m wracked by fears, anxieties — hating the thought
of the water,
hating the thought of land, where surely hostile natives will claim some few of our lives, if not the majority. It’s easy for you, good Tiphys, to talk in this cheerful
vein.
Your care is only for your own life, whereas I, I must
care
for all your lives. No wonder if I never sleep!’ So
I spoke,
playing the necessary game (and yet I confess, I
enjoyed it,
querning the world to words) — and the whole crew rose
to it,
or all but one. ‘No man,’ they cried, ‘in the whole world could vie with Jason as fitting lord of the Argonauts! It’s surely that very anxiety which wrecks your sleep that steers the Argo safely past every catastrophe! Never doubt it, man! We’d rather be dead, every one
of us,
than see you harmed by Pelias!’ With old unwatered
wine
they drank my health and set up such shouts that the
sea-wall rang
and I nearly shouted myself. But Orpheus looked
toward shore,
not drinking. I ignored the matter. ‘My friends,’ I said,
‘your courage
fills me again with confidence. The resolution you show in the face of these monstrous perils has
made me feel
I could sail through hell itself and be calm as a god.’
Thus I
played Captain, kept their morale up. I needn’t deny
I enjoyed it.
Was it my fault the Argonauts — even the slyest (Mopsos and Idmon, for instance) — had natures a flow
of words
could carry away like sticks? And was it my fault that
words
were my specialty? I ask you, what other choice did
I have?—
though Orpheus watched me, scorned me, keener than
the rest at spying
craft (a wordsman himself, though one of a very
dissimilar
kind). He said in private, later, avoiding my eyes, tuning his lyre with fingers as light as wings, ‘Come,
come!
“Limb from limb,” Lord Jason! This is surely some new
Pelias—
the stuttering mouse turned lion!’ ‘I do what I must,’
I said.
‘Would you have me tell them the truth — that life
itself, all our pain
is idiocy?’ He feigned surprise. ‘You think so, Jason?’ I knew his game. Play innocent, defensive. Draw out
your man,
give him the rope to hang himself. And I knew, too, his arrogance. It’s easy for the poets to carp at the men who lead, the drab decision-makers who waste no time on niceties — pretty figures merely for aesthetics’ sake, rhymes for the sake of rhymes. They see all the world
as forms
to be juxtaposed, proved beautiful — no higher purpose than harmony, the static world proved lovely as it is. But what world’s static? We create, and we long for
poets’ support,
we who contract for whatever praise or blame is due and get the blame — ah, blame that outlasts our acts
by centuries!
“I said: ‘My friend, we’re booty hunters. We’ve come
this far,
murdered and lost this many men — the friendly king of the Doliones, Herakles, Hylas, Polydeukes, and the rest — for nothing but a boast, an adventure
of boys. It’s time
we turned those crimes to account. I think it’s easy for
you
to be filled with pompous integrity. My job’s more dull. Whatever high meaning our journey may have — or
lack of meaning—
my job is to carry us through. That means morale, poet. That means unity, brotherhood!’ Orpheus smiled, ironic, avoiding my eyes, and not from embarrassment, it
seemed to me,
but as if to glance for a moment in my direction would
be
bad art, misuse of his skills. He glanced at Argus,
instead,
our sly artificer, who smiled. They have a league, these
artists:
a solid front in defense of their grandiose visions of the
real,
destroyers of sticks and stones. I was angry enough,
God knows.
But that, too, went with the job.
“He said: Your pilot’s sick.
I studied him, puzzled. He looked at his lyre. Tour
beloved Tiphys
is sick, at death’s very door. Does that make you
“anxious,” Captain?
Does it make you a trifle remorseful of your fine facility for turning all passing remarks to the common good?’
What could
I say? What would anyone say, in my position? I glanced at Tiphys, standing at the oar. The wind rolled through
his hair,
his eyes were alert. He looked like a fellow who’d live
six hundred
years, Queen Hera’s darling. I glanced back at Orpheus. ‘I don’t believe it.’ But the devil had shaken me, no lie.
And he spoke
the truth, as we all found later. Meanwhile Orpheus
played,
catching the rhythm of the oars, and little by little,
gently,
all but imperceptibly, he increased the tempo. We passed the river Rhebas and the peak of the Colone,
and soon
the Black Cape too, and the outfall of the river Phyllis where Phrixos once put down with the golden ram.
Through all
that day and through all the windless night we labored
at the oar,
to Orpheus’ hurrying beat. We worked like oxen
ploughing
the dark, moist earth. The sweat pours down from flank
and neck,
their rolling eyes glare out askance from the creaking
yoke,
hot blasts of breath come rumbling from their mouths,
and all day long
they plough on, digging their sharp hooves into the
soil. So we
ploughed on, goaded by the lyre. (I understood well
enough
his meaning. So poets too can govern ships. That was no news.) Near dawn — at the time of day when the sun has not yet touched the heavens, though
the darkness fades—
we reached the harbor of the lonely island of Thynias and crawled ashore exhausted, gasping for air. All at
once
the lyre was still, and the man at the lyre looked up,
strange-eyed,
and lo and behold, we saw the god Apollo striding like a man. His golden locks streamed down like
swirling sunlight,
his silver bow half blinding. The island trembled beneath his feet, and the sea ran high on the grassy shore. We
stood
stock-still and dared not meet his eyes. He passed
through the air
and was gone.
“Then Orpheus found his voice. ‘O Argonauts,
let us dedicate this island to holy Apollo, lord of peace, and song, and healing, and let us sing together and swear our lasting brotherhood, and build him a
temple
to be called the Temple of Concord as long as the world
may last.’
We did so — poured libations out and, touching the
sacrifice,
swore by the solemnest oaths that we’d stand by one
another
forever. A moving ceremony. I did not say as much as I thought to Orpheus after he’d ended it.