| The Trojan Socus Lies Dying at the
Hands of Odysseus Robert Cooperman |
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I always played it safe, content to fight men about whom no songs would ever be sung. But when Odysseus cut down Charops~ my blood-brother~I raged, "Today, you die!" The flesh wound enraged him. I turned and ran; his spear caught me between my shoulder blades, tore through my chest; dust smothered my nostrils. He yanked out his spear and spun me over, as you'd right a tortoise that vicious boys have set on its spine, to watch it flail and die. I thought it a kindness to a fallen foe; but he wanted me to see and tremble at the vultures circling low and lower. Even after they plucked out my two eyes, |
I couldn't die, but heard them, felt their beaks taking their pleasure on my stubborn corpse. "Kill me!" I'd hiss now, but they've found my tongue, reduced me to croaking like Philomel, after Tereus had raped and maimed her. I'll lie forever, unable to die, unless this already is grim Hades, and I'm condemned to be forever pecked and taloned by these carrion creatures. Be damned, Odysseus, may you never find your way back to stony Ithaka, or if you do finally reach that shore, may you mourn your palace in disorder, your wife raped and dead, your son's bloody head  |
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