Then fling me piecemeal to the main
And ’mid the waves destroy.
If death is certain, let me die
By hands that share humanity.’
He ended, and before us flung
About our knees in suppliance clung.
His name, his race we bid him show,
And what the story of his woe:
Anchises’ self his hand extends
And bids the trembler count us friends
Then by degrees he laid aside
His fear, and presently replied.
And Achemenides my name,
The comrade of Ulysses’ woes:
For Troy I left my father’s door,
Poor Adamastus; both were poor;
Ah! would these fates had been as those!
Me, in their eager haste to fly
The scene of hideous butchery,
My unreflecting countrymen
Left in the Cyclops’ savage den.
All foul with gore that banquet-room
Immense and dreadful in its gloom.
He, lofty towering, strikes the skies
(Snatch him, ye Gods, from mortal eyes!):
No kindly look e’er crossed his face,
Ne’er oped his lips in courteous grace:
The limbs of wretches are his food:
He champs their flesh, and quaffs their blood.
I saw, when his enormous hand
Plucked forth two victims from our band,
Swung round, and on the threshold dashed,
While all the floor with blood was splashed:
I saw him grind them, bleeding fresh,
And close his teeth on quivering flesh:
Not unrequited: such a wrong
My wily chieftain brooked not long:
E’en in that dire extreme of ill
Ulysses was Ulysses still.
For when o’ercome with sleep and wine
Along the cave he lay supine,
Ejecting from his monstrous maw
Wine mixed with gore and gobbets raw,
We pray to Heaven, our parts dispose,
And in a circle round him close.
With sharpened point that eyeball pierce
Which ’neath his brow glared lone and fierce,
Like Argive shield or sun’s broad light,
And thus our comrades’ death requite.
But fly, unhappy, fly, and tear
Your anchors from the shore:
For vast as Polyphemus there
Guards, feeds, and milks his fleecy care,
On the sea’s margin make their home
And o’er the lofty mountains roam
A hundred Cyclops more.
Three moons their circuit nigh have made,
Since in wild den or woodland shade
My wretched life I trail,
See Cyclops stalk from rock to rock,
And tremble at their footsteps’ shock,
And at their voices quail.
Hard cornel fruits that life sustain,
And grasses gathered from the plain.
Long looking round, at last I scanned
Your vessels bearing to the strand.
Whate’er you proved, I vowed me yours:
Enough, to ’scape these bloody shores.
Become yourselves my slayers, and kill
This destined wretch which way you will.’
Down from the lofty rock
We see the monster Polypheme
Advancing ’mid his flock,
In quest the well-known shore to find,
Huge, awful, hideous, ghastly, blind.
A pine-tree, plucked from earth, makes strong
His tread, and guides his steps along.
His sheep upon their master wait,
Sole joy, sole solace of his fate.
Soon as he touched the ocean waves
And reached the level flood,
Groaning and gnashing fierce, he laves
His socket from the blood,
And through the deepening water strides,
While scarce the billows bathe his sides.
With wildered haste we speed our flight,
Admit the suppliant, as of right,
And noiseless loose the ropes;
Our quick oars sweep the blue profound:
The giant hears, and toward the sound
With outstretched hands he gropes.
But when he grasps and grasps in vain,
Still headed by the Ionian main,
To heaven he lifts a monstrous roar,
Which sends a shudder through the waves,
Shakes to its base the Italian shore,
And echoing runs through Ætna’s caves.
From rocks and woods the Cyclop host
Rush startled forth, and crowd the coast.
There glaring fierce we see them stand
In idle rage, a hideous band,
The sons of Ætna, carrying high
Their towering summits to the sky:
So on a height stand clustering trees,
Tall oaks, or cone-clad cypresses,
The stately forestry of Jove,
Or Dian’s venerable grove.
Fierce panic bids us set our sail,
And stand to catch the first fair gale.
But stronger e’en than present fear
The thought of Helenus the seer,
Who counselled still those seas to fly
Where Scylla and Charybdis lie:
That path of double death we shun,
And think a backward course to run.
When lo! from out Pelorus’ strait
The northern breezes blow:
We pass Pantagia’s rocky gate,
And Megara, where vessels wait,
And Thapsus, pillowed low.
So, measuring back familiar seas,
Land after land before us shows
The rescued Achemenides,
The comrade of Ulysses’ woes.
Against Plemyrium’s billowy steep,
Ortygia’s island lies:
Alpheus, Elis’ stream, they say,
Beneath the seas here found his way,
And now his waters interfuse
With thine, O fountain Arethuse,
Beneath Sicilian skies.
We pray to those high powers: and then
Pass rich Helorus’ stagnant fen.
Pachynus’ lofty cliffs we graze,
Projecting o’er the main,
And Camarina meets our gaze
Which fate forbad to drain,
And Gela’s fields, and Gela’s wall,
And Gela’s stream, that names them all.
High-towering Acragas succeeds,
The sire one day of generous steeds;
Selinus’ palms I leave behind,
And Lilybeum’s shallows blind.
Then Drepanum becomes my host,
And takes me to its joyless coast.
All tempest-tost and weary, there
I lose my stay in
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