release my breaking heart—my own godlike son ...
You with the North Wind’s help had coaxed the gales
to send him scudding over the barren salt sea—
you, always plotting miseries for my son,
you bore him off to the crowded town of Cos.
But there I saved him, whisked him away to safety,
back to the stallion-land of Argos, worn with torment.
I will help you remember—you’ll give up your treacheries,
you will see if your warm embraces serve you then,
your bed of lust where you sank me in your arms.
Down from the gods you came to waylay me—
you seduced me blind.”
Her eyes wide,
Queen Hera shuddered before his thunder,
protesting, swearing a flight of winged oaths:
“Earth be my witness now, the vaulting Sky above
and the dark cascading waters of the Styx—I swear
by the greatest, grimmest oath that binds the happy gods!
By your sacred head, by the bed of our own marriage
that I, at least, would never take in vain ...
Never by will of mine did the god of earthquakes
wreak havoc among the Trojan ranks and Hector
and surge to help their foes!
It must be his own great rage that drives him on—
he pitied the sight of Argives pinned against their ships.
Not I ... why, I’d be the first to counsel him
to take your lead, Zeus, wherever you command,
my king of the black cloud!”
A rousing appeal,
and the father of men and gods looked down and smiled
and took command with a flight of winging orders:
“Excellent, Hera. Now, if in the years to come
you will accord with me, my wide-eyed Queen,
throned with me in the gods’ decisive sessions,
then Poseidon, bent as he is to go his own way,
must change at once and wrench his will to ours,
to yours and mine united.
So then, Hera,
if you mean what you say, down to the last word,
go back now to the deathless tribes of gods
and summon Iris to come before my presence,
summon Apollo too, lord of the famous bow.
Iris will fly to Achaea’s bronze-armed troops
and direct the god who shakes the earth to stop,
to quit the war and return to his own ocean halls.
And let Apollo drive Prince Hector back to battle,
breathe power back in his lungs, make him forget
the pains that rack his heart. Let him whip the Achaeans
in headlong panic rout and roll them back once more,
tumbling back on the oar-swept ships of Peleus’ son Achilles.
And he, he will launch his comrade Patroclus into action
and glorious Hector will cut him down with a spear
in front of Troy, once Patroclus has slaughtered
whole battalions of strong young fighting men
and among them all, my shining son Sarpedon.
But then—enraged for Patroctus—
brilliant Achilles will bring Prince Hector down.
And then, from that day on, I’ll turn the tide of war:
back the fighting goes, no stopping it, ever, all the way
till Achaean armies seize the beetling heights of Troy
through Athena’s grand design.
But till that hour
I will never cease my anger. Nor will I permit
a single immortal god to save the Argive forces,
not till Achilles’ prayer has been fulfilled.
So I vowed at first. I bowed my head in assent
that day the goddess Thetis clutched my knees,
begging me to exalt Achilles scourge of cities.“
And the white-armed goddess Hera obeyed at once—
clearing Ida’s peaks she soared for sheer Olympus.
Quick as a thought goes flashing through a man
who’s traveled the world—“Ah to be there, or there!”—
as his mind swarms with journeys, fresh desires—
so quick in her eager flight flew noble Hera now
and scaling steep Olympus went among the gods,
the immortal powers thronging Zeus’s halls.
They all sprang to their feet at sight of Hera,
lifting cups to greet her, crowding round the queen.
But she passed the rest and took a cup from Themis,
flushed with beauty, who ran to meet her first
and hailed her now with winged words of welcome:
“Hera, what brings you back? You look so harried.
Oh I know it, the son of Cronus has terrified you—
your everlasting husband!”
“Please, Themis,”
the white-armed goddess Hera answered firmly,
“don’t ask me to go through that ordeal again.
You know his rage yourself. So rigid, unrelenting.
But you keep on presiding over the gods, Themis,
the feasting in the halls. You’ll hear it all,
and with you all the immortals—
what a chain of disasters Zeus brings to light!
Nothing to lift all spirits alike, I warn you ...
not among men, not among gods, if one’s still left
who warms to feasts, his heart at peace, these days.”
With those bleak words Queen Hera took her seat.
The gods looked grim throughout the halls of Zeus:
She smiled with her lips only,
her forehead furrowed over her dark brows
as her anguish rose and she addressed them alclass="underline"
“What fools we are, storming against Zeus—we’re mad!
And still we engage him, trying to block his way
with a word or show of force. But there he sits,
off and away—with never a care or qualm for us—
claiming that he among the deathless gods on high
is first in strength and power, none in the world his rival.
So each of you here must take what blows he sends.
Why, Ares, I gather, has just received his share ...
his son is dead in battle, his dearest son, Ascalaphus—
doesn’t invincible Ares claim to be his father?”
Fighting words, and Ares pounded his sturdy thighs
with the flats of both hands and let loose in grief:
“Now, you gods of Olympus—who could blame me now
if I descend on Achaea’s ships to avenge my son,
my butchered son? Even if fate will crush me,
striking me down with the thunderbolt of Zeus—
sprawled in the blood and dust with dead men’s corpsesl”
With that he called his henchmen Rout and Terror
to yoke his team as the god strapped on his shining gear.
And now some greater disaster might have come from Zeus,
some wrath, some harsher rage to break the gods on high—
if Pallas Athena, fearing the worst for all immortals,
had not leapt from her throne, bolted through the gates,
torn the helmet off his head, the shield from his back
and snatching the brazen spear from his burly grip,