Eagle Omen

8So spoke Telemachus. The Thunderer, Zeus,
Sent flying from a lofty mountaintop
Two eagles. First they floated on the wind
Close to each other, and with wings outspread;
But as they came to where the murmuring crowd
Was gathered just beneath their flight, they turned
And clapped their heavy pinions, looking down
With deadly omen on the heads below,
And with their talons tore each other’s cheeks
And necks, and then they darted to the right
Away through Ithaca among its roofs.
All who beheld the eagles were amazed,
And wondered what event was near at hand.
Among the rest an aged hero spoke,
Named Halitherses, Mastor’s son. He knew
More truly than the others of his age,
To augur from the flight of birds, and read
The will of fate —and wisely thus he spoke: —

9“Hear, men of Ithaca, what I shall say.
I speak of what most narrowly concerns
The suitors, over whom already hangs
Great peril, for Odysseus will not be
Long at a distance from his home and friends.
Even now he is not far, and meditates
Slaughter and death to all the suitor train;
And evil will ensue to many more
Of us, who dwell in sunny Ithaca.
Now let us think what measures may restrain
These men —or let them of their own accord
Desist —the soonest were for them the best.
For not as one untaught do I foretell
Events to come, but speak of what I know.
All things that I predicted to our chief,
What time the Argive troops embarked for Troy,
And sage Odysseus with them, are fulfilled;
I said that after many hardships borne,
And all his comrades lost, the twentieth year
Would bring him back, a stranger to us all —
And all that then I spoke of comes to pass.”