Gods Gather to Laugh

28“O Father Zeus, and all you blessed ones,
And deathless! Come, for here is what will move
Your laughter, yet is not to be endured.
Zeus’ daughter, Aphrodite, thus dishonors me,
Lame as I am, and loves the butcher Ares;
For he is well to look at, and is sound
Of foot, while I am weakly —but for this
Are none but my two parents to be blamed,
Who never should have given me birth. Behold
Where lie embraced the lovers in my bed —
A hateful sight. Yet they will hardly take
Even a short slumber there, though side by side,
Enamored as they are; nor will they both
Be drowsy very soon. The net and chains
Will hold them till her father shall restore
All the large gifts which, on our marriage-day,
I gave him to possess the impudent minx
His daughter, who is fair, indeed, but false.”

29He spoke, and to the brazen palace flocked
The gods; there Poseidon came, who shakes the earth;
There came beneficent Hermes; there too came
Apollo, archer-god; the goddesses,
Through womanly reserve, remained at home.
Meantime the gods, the givers of all good,
Stood in the entrance; and as they beheld
The cunning snare of Hephaestus, there arose
Infinite laughter from the blessed ones,
And one of them bespoke his neighbor thus: —

30“Wrong prospers not; the slow overtakes the swift.
Hephaestus the slow has trapped the fleetest god
Upon Olympus, Ares; though lame himself,
His net has taken the adulterer,
Who now must pay the forfeit of his crime.”