Helen Redeemed and Other Poems | Page 3

plain?About her like a carpet; from whose height?The watchman, ten years watching, every night?Counteth the beacon fires and sees no less?Their number as the years wax and duress?Of hunger thins the townsmen day by day--?More than the Greeks kill plague and famine slay.?Here in their wind-swept city, ten long years?Beset and in this tenth in blood and tears?And havocry to fall, old Priam's sons?Guard still their gods, their wives and little ones,?Guard Helen still, for whose fair womanhood?The sin was done, woe wrought, and all the blood?Of Danaan and Dardan in their pride?Shed; nor yet so the end, for Heré cried?Shrill on the heights more vengeance on wrong done,?And Greek or Trojan paid it. Late or soon?By sword or bitter arrow they went hence,?Each with their goodliest paying one man's offence.?Goodliest in Troy fell Hector; back to Greek?Then swung the doomstroke, and to Dis the bleak?Must pass great Hector's slayer. Zeus on high,?Hidden from men, held up the scales; the sky?Told Thetis that her son must go the way?He sent Queen Hecuba's--himself must pay,?Himself though young, splendid Achilles' self,?The price of manslaying, with blood for pelf.?A grief immortal took her, and she grieved?Deep in sea-cave, whereover restless heaved?The wine-dark ocean--silently, not moving,?Tearless, a god. O Gods, however loving,?That is a lonely grief that must go dry?About the graves where the beloved lie,?And knows too much to doubt if death ends all?Pleasure in strength of limb, joy musical,?Mother-love, maiden-love, which never more?Must the dead look for on the further shore?Of Acheron, and past the willow-wood?Of Proserpine!
But when he understood,?Achilles, that his end was near at hand,?Darkling he heard the news, and on the strand?Beyond the ships he stood awhile, then cried?The Sea-God that high-hearted and clear-eyed?He might go down; and this for utmost grace?He asked, that not by battle might his face?Be marred, nor fighting might some Dardan best?Him who had conquered ever. For the rest,?Fate, which had given, might take, as fate should be.?So prayed he, and Poseidon out of the sea,?There where the deep blue into sand doth fade?And the long wave rolls in, a bar of jade,?Sent him a portent in that sea-blue bird?Swifter than light, the halcyon; and men heard?The trumpet of his praise: "Shaker of Earth,?Hail to thee! Now I fare to death in mirth,?As to a banquet!"
So when day was come?Lightly arose the prince to meet his doom,?And kissed Brise?s where she lay abed?And never more by hers might rest his head:?"Farewell, my dear, farewell, my joy," said he;?"Farewell to all delights 'twixt thee and me!?For now I take a road whose harsh alarms?Forbid so sweet a burden to my arms."?Then his clean limbs his weeping squires bedight?In all the mail Hephaistos served his might?Withal, of breastplate shining like the sun?Upon flood-water, three-topped helm whereon?Gleamed the gold basilisk, and goodly greaves.?These bore he without word; but when from sheaves?Of spears they picked the great ash Pelian?Poseidon gave to Peleus, God to a man,?For no man's manège else--than all men's fear:?"Dry and cold fighting for thee this day, my spear,"?Quoth he. And so when one the golden shield?Immortal, daedal, for no one else to wield,?Cast o'er his head, he frowned: "On thy bright face?Let me see who shall dare a dint," he says,?And stood in thought full-armed; thereafter poured?Libation at the tent-door to the Lord?Of earth and sky, and prayed, saying: "O Thou?That hauntest dark Dodona, hear me now,?Since that the shadowing arm of Time is flung?Far over me, but cloudeth me full young.?Scatheless I vow them. Let one Trojan cast?His spear and loose my spirit. Rage is past?Though I go forth my most provocative?Adventure: 'tis not I that seek. Receive?My prayer Thou as I have earned it--lo,?Dying I stand, and hail Thee as I go?Lord of the ?gis, wonderful, most great!"?Which done, he took his stand, and bid his mate?Urge on the steeds; and all the Achaian host?Followed him, not with outcry or loud boast?Of deeds to do or done, but silent, grim?As to a shambles--so they followed him,?Eyeing that nodding crest and swaying spear?Shake with the chariot. Solemn thus they near?The Trojan walls, slow-moving, as by a Fate?Driven; and thus before the Skaian Gate?Stands he in pomp of dreadful calm, to die,?As once in dreadful haste to slay.
Thereby?The walls were thick with men, and in the towers?Women stood gazing, clustered close as flowers?That blur the rocks in some high mountain pass?With delicate hues; but like the gray hill-grass?Which the wind sweepeth, till in waves of light?It tideth backwards--so all gray or white?Showed they, as sudden surges moved them cloak?Their heads, or bare their faces. And none spoke?Among them, for there stood not woman there?But mourned her dead, or sensed not in the air?Her pendent doom of death, or worse than death.?Frail as flowers were their faces, and all breath?Came short and quick, as on